


The Husbands Of Felicity Smoak

by always_a_queen



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Angst and Romance, Canon-Typical Violence, Captivity, Child Abuse, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mild Language, Multi, Non-Consensual Drug Use, OT3, Sexual Content, Slow Build, Smoaking billionaires, Temporary Character Death, Tommy Merlyn is Alive, Trauma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-03
Updated: 2017-12-03
Packaged: 2018-05-24 09:52:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 22
Words: 111,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6149728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/always_a_queen/pseuds/always_a_queen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I love her,” Tommy says helplessly, glancing down at the ring on his finger. “I do. And as happy as I’ve been with her, I’d go back and trade places with you in an instant if it meant she never had to go through the pain of losing you.”</p>
<p>//</p>
<p>When Oliver Queen dies to protect his sister, Felicity Smoak becomes a widow at the tender age of twenty-seven. She doesn’t expect she’ll ever get married again, but Tommy Merlyn has always been someone who defies her expectations. For four months, her marriage to him gives her a joy she’d never thought she’d experience again…</p>
<p>…and then her first husband comes back from the dead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. PART ONE: CHAPTER ONE

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Abbie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Abbie/gifts), [StoriesOfImagination](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StoriesOfImagination/gifts), [ohemgeeitscoley](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohemgeeitscoley/gifts).



> This fic has a bit of a slow build, but stay with me. We'll get there.
> 
> Huge thanks to Abbie, storiesofimagination, and ohemgeeitscoley for the cheerleading and hand holding and the screaming at me in capslock. You guys make this so much fun.

[ ](http://tinypic.com?ref=2dkk40h)

 

Felicity should perhaps find it strange that the main similarity between the first time she meets Oliver Queen and the first time she meets Tommy Merlyn is that they’re both bleeding to death at the time. She knows them before each incident, of course. Oliver is a perplexing distraction in her office every few weeks. Tommy is a constant presence around Verdant, but since he mostly stays upstairs while Felicity mostly stays downstairs, the crossing of their paths is usually accompanied by a polite smile and a nod.

Even so, Felicity may have met “Oliver Queen” when he strolled into her office with a banged-up laptop, but she first met _Oliver_ when he pulled off a green hood in her backseat and asked for her help. Her brain has always made the distinction. Oliver Queen wanted a favor. Oliver needed her help.

In the same way, Felicity doesn’t quite consider the occasional passing smile at Tommy Merlyn any sort of official introduction. They knew _of_ each other, but they were always headed in different directions, pulled away by conflicting distractions.

Except now.

Now, he’s just another man suffering from extreme blood loss in her backseat while she attempts to navigate her mini cooper through the war zone that Starling City has become in the wake of the earthquake machine she couldn’t stop.

Oliver Queen is squashed in her backseat; his best friend is next to him with a six-inch piece of rebar that has pierced right through his shoulder. Felicity isn’t sure if he’s still conscious. All she can hear is Oliver pleading with Tommy to stay with them.

Eventually, it becomes the mantra echoing in her head too. _Stay with me. Stay with me, Tommy._

There’s a green leather suit in her trunk from when Oliver hastily changed clothes and balled up wipes smeared with greenish-black paint all over the floor in the backseat. Felicity has blood caked under her nails and dripping down a slowly bleeding gash on her forearm.

When they get to the hospital, Tommy is rushed into surgery while Felicity and Oliver are stuck in the main body of the ER getting patched up. Felicity only needs a few stitches on her arm, but she stays by Oliver’s side while the wound in his shoulder is treated.

After that, they’re sent off to a waiting room. She sits; he paces. Felicity, at least, has her tablet and the ability to keep a constant eye on the news sources.

It’s pretty bleak, even just looking at the low estimates for casualties. The city may never be the same again.

Laurel comes running in with tears streaming down her face. Oliver stops his pacing long enough to grab her in a hug it takes her a few moments to accept. Over Laurel’s shoulder, Felicity can see the distress on Oliver’s face, the unspoken guilt.

He blames himself for this. Of course he does. He blames himself for _everything_. It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out.

The problem is Felicity can’t quite stop blaming _herself_. She should have figured out there was another device. If she had, they wouldn’t be here. Her backseat wouldn’t be covered in blood.

For hours, they wait. She brings Oliver and Laurel coffee and muffins, but beyond that, there’s nothing to do but let time pass. It goes by slowly, with little in the way of distractions offered to them.

Even when Oliver finally sits next to her and tells her that no one expects her to stay, that she can go home, she refuses. She doesn’t know Tommy all that well, but she knows that he just lost his father and his mother has been gone since he was little. She knows he has no siblings. She knows that he and Laurel recently broke up. She knows that he’s been a dear friend to Oliver.

She knows he deserves people sitting in a waiting room for him.

And then there’s Oliver, distraught, pacing, carrying a world’s worth of guilt on his shoulders. He’s her friend, and even if her support is bland muffins and horrible coffee and just being _there_ , she’s going to give it. He deserves nothing less.

At some point, she does fall asleep. Her head falls so it rests on Oliver’s shoulder, and she dreams of the foundry collapsing on top of her and burying her in rubble.

She wakes up gasping, but doesn’t tell Oliver about it. He rubs her shoulder a little and tells her Tommy’s out of surgery and resting comfortably. Dig, Thea Queen, and Thea’s boyfriend, Roy, have shown up during her nap. Felicity gets a quick hug from Diggle before following the rest of the group out of the waiting room.

The six of them step into Tommy’s room right as the sun is rising. There’s still not much to do and there aren’t many chairs. After a few moments of being able to reassure herself that the very pretty man did not, in fact, die in her backseat, Felicity excuses herself. Oliver follows her to the elevator.

“Thank you for staying,” he says as she pushes the down button.

“My—well, not really my pleasure, but… you know.” None of the typical responses to ‘thank you’ feel appropriate in this situation, so she stops trying to find one. “I’m glad he’s okay.”

And then, because she’s on essentially no sleep at all, she puts her hand on Oliver’s arm and says, “I’m glad you’re okay.”

He’s not, at least not completely. But something about seeing Tommy alive and hearing the heart monitor beeping and watching his chest rise and fall with each breath appears to have calmed him down. Worry isn’t evident in the way he stands anymore. She can’t see deep concern in his eyes. Just exhaustion.

They have to talk about what their next steps are, what they’re going to do with the foundry destroyed, where they’re going to go, but that’s a conversation for later.

For now, Felicity pushes up on her toes and pulls Oliver into a hug. She’s not one hundred percent sure he’s even the hugging type, but she needs it, and she suspects he does too.

It’s the crossing of a previously established physical boundary in their relationship, but Oliver doesn’t seem to notice, sinking into her arms like he belongs there.

And maybe, in a way, he does.

The elevator doors open, and Felicity steps inside. She gives Oliver a little wave and says, “See you tomorrow.”

Which is wrong. She doesn’t see him the next day, or the day after, or the day after that, because while he’s in Starling for a week after the Glades fall, he doesn’t contact her at all. Her calls aren’t answered and her texts go without a response. She contacts Dig, but Dig hasn’t heard from him either.

It’s like he’s dropped off of the face of the earth.

Felicity goes to see Tommy once while he’s recovering. Flowers don’t seem like the sort of thing he would appreciate, but she brings him a soft brown teddy bear holding a stuffed red heart that says “Get better soon,” on it.

The room is empty except for Tommy and the nurse who passes Felicity on her way through the door.

Tommy looks up at her with hopeful eyes, but the hope fades quickly. “I think you might have the wrong room.”

If Felicity were a less headstrong person, she might have agreed with him, might have murmured an apology and spun on her heel and left with embarrassment causing a blush to spread over her cheeks. Instead, she just says, “You’re Tommy Merlyn. You were bleeding in my car. I have the right room.”

He blinks, surprised. “I was?”

She nods. “You needed a hospital. I don’t blame you for not remembering me.”

Tipping his head just a little, he squints at her. “I do know you. Oliver hired you to take care of the wifi at Verdant.”

She nods. They’d never really exchanged more than a few texts. The wifi was a good cover for her presence because it was _true_. They were having problems, and it required scheduling with the person managing the bar more than the preoccupied owner using it as a front.

He’d also been the one who cut her the check for fixing everything.

“I just…” she shrugs. “Wanted to see that you were okay. Not every day someone almost dies in your car after a freak earthquake.”

Tommy frowns. “Why was I in your car? Why were you there?”

“Oliver called me,” she answers. It’s the truth. But it was over a comm. unit, and she’d already been in her car on the way to his location. “I was close.”

“ _Oliver_ called you,” he says, and she pushes down a sense of panic. He doesn’t believe her. And he knows about Oliver’s extra-curricular activities. He could put two and two together and figure out the truth.

She wonders how much of a bad thing that would really be. He knows about Oliver and hasn’t turned him in. But maybe that’s friendship. Maybe he would protect her to protect Oliver.

She’s just not _sure_ , and she’s not willing to gamble with Oliver’s well-being, much less her own.

So instead, she holds out the bear with both hands. “Here,” she says, and Tommy _smiles_. It’s a little lopsided, but it lights up his eyes as he takes the stuffed animal from her.

“He’s adorable,” Tommy says, and maybe he’s a little loopy on pain medication, because he kisses it on the forehead before setting it down on the bed next to him. “Thank you.”

He’s easy to smile back at. “You’re welcome.”

It gets silent then, neither of them quite sure what to say. After a few moments, the quiet overwhelms her, and she says, “You probably need rest so I should—”

“Felicity?” he asks, and she stops.

“Yes?”

“Have you seen Oliver?”

She shakes her head no. “Not since… not since that night, no. And he’s ignoring all my calls and texts.”

Tommy sighs and turns his head away from her. So Oliver is ignoring him too. She’s not sure if that makes her feel marginally better or if it just angers her that Oliver has gone MIA.

Especially when his best friend just lost his dad and has been stuck in the hospital.

She feels no guilt over the death of Malcolm Merlyn. It was Oliver’s call, and the man _decimated_ part of her city because he deemed the people there beneath him. She won’t mourn him. She won’t miss him. She can say nothing more than ‘good riddance’.

But he was Tommy’s father. And she sort of thinks that whether Tommy wants to or not, he’s going to grieve his dad. Maybe not for who the man was, but definitely for who he _wanted_ him to be.

And that’s why Felicity pulls up a chair. “I’m sorry,” she says softly. “About your father.”

“You’d be the only one,” he snaps bitterly. Then, he seems to catch himself. He clears his throat. “Thank you, I guess. He was a shitty dad. He was a shitty _person_.”

“Doesn’t mean you won’t miss him,” Felicity says, because she doesn’t quite understand the death of a father but she sure as hell knows the _loss_ of one. “My dad took off when I was little. Just up and left. Doesn’t mean I still don’t miss him. It’s stupid as hell, but somehow it seems that it’s just… how people work.”

Whatever was eating at Tommy fades away. The conversation turns, and before Felicity knows it she’s passed the entire afternoon there, chatting with him.

She means to go back. She has every intention of returning to see him, but between the turmoil within Queen Consolidated and her determination to find Oliver, she doesn’t make it back to the hospital for a while, and when she _does_ , she finds out that Tommy was released.

And then it becomes abundantly clear that Oliver has no intention of coming back.

Felicity grits her teeth and stares at the million dollars that has suddenly appeared in her bank account. She looks around at a floundering Starling City, looks at the distress and hopelessness that’s everywhere. She stares at the green leather jacket in her car trunk with the hole in its shoulder and blood staining the material.

And she knows what Starling needs.

Better than that, she knows how to find him. He didn’t cover his tracks well, and the money trail leads her right to his exact location without really having to put in a lot of _effort_.

The one thing she doesn’t know is how to get him to come home. Sure, she could fly out there with determination and a prayer, but she’d rather have a trump card. Something he doesn’t expect.

And she has an idea of where to find that as well.

* * *

 

Malcolm Merlyn is not given a funeral, in the traditional sense. Tommy buries him, because the man was a monster but the man was his father. He strongly objects to his father’s wish that he be buried beside his late wife, and he downright _scoffs_ at the idea of “beloved father” as the inscription on Malcolm’s grave. He packs up every bit of evidence that Malcolm was ever the Dark Archer and puts it in storage. He talks to a realtor about selling the house he was never welcome in. He hides from the press and angry parents who lost children, furious fathers who lost homes.

Laurel shows up on his doorstep with wine and ice cream and he tries to send her away three times before he finally relents. It’s not a bad conversation, when it gets down to it, but it doesn’t end up solving anything.

They love each other. But there are some things love can’t do, some problems it can’t solve. Tommy and Laurel are plagued by several big ones. An evening of togetherness and frank conversation doesn’t solve them all. It does give them a cleaner break. Tommy hugs her goodbye and kisses her forehead and wishes her well. He wants her in his life, wants her to be okay, to be _happy_.

He was still on the board of Merlyn Global when the Glades fell, and as soon as he can he starts angling for the company to do everything in its power to help rebuild the Glades and right whatever of his father’s wrongs he can. Then Merlyn Global is absorbed by Stellmoor International, and they want to cut all ties with the Merlyn name, so Tommy takes the time to negotiate a fair severance package (because fuck Malcolm and his _legacy_ , but Tommy put blood, sweat, and tears into this company. He worked from a hospital room to make sure everything in his power was done to help the people whose lives his father destroyed, and if Stellmoor is going to capitalize off of his goodwill then he’s going to take enough to keep him on his feet when they kick him to the curb) and waves it aside.

He’s not jobless for long, because Thea approaches him barely a day later with plans for reopening Verdant.

And the day after _that_ , Felicity Smoak shows up at his doorstep.

“I need your help,” she says. “It’s about Oliver.”

There’s no acceptable response to that but to step back and allow her in. “Right. _Oliver_. What’s wrong with Oliver?”

“He’s gone,” she says flatly. “And I need to bring him back here. This city needs him.”

Before, Tommy had been operating only on the suspicion that Felicity knew about Oliver’s nightly activities, but those words change it from _possibility_ to _certainty_.

“The city needs him?”

She gives him a _look_. It’s tipped head and pursed lips and rather adorable, actually. “Look. I know what you know and you probably know what I know, so just… you have to _know_ why I need to bring him back. This city is falling apart, and people need hope.”

Tommy crosses his arms. Her conviction is endearing, if, he thinks, misguided. “And you think a murderous vigilante in a hood is something that’s going to give people _hope_ , Felicity?”

She reaches into her bag and pulls out a green hood. Tommy’s stomach turns.

“I think that what he did worked,” she says. “I think that he stopped bad people from doing bad things. I think he protected people, saved lives. I _saw_ it, Tommy.”

“Even if I believed that, why couldn’t you bring him back yourself?”

“Because I think I know why he left, and if I’m right, then he doesn’t just need to hear that the city needs him.” She takes a step towards him and holds out the hood. “He needs you.”

He takes it tentatively, rubbing his fingers across it. The material is not as rough or textured as he would expect. “Why me?”

“Because…” She sighs deeply. “If I know Oliver, he’s destroying himself with his own guilt. And I could wait for him to stop brooding and return on his own, but this is _you_ he thinks he hurt. He might never come back.”

It’s _those_ words that give him pause, because he’s lived in a world where Oliver didn’t come back. He doesn’t want to do it again. Ever.

There’s also Thea to think about. Thea, who is torn apart by her mother’s involvement in Malcolm’s schemes. Thea who has him but still needs her brother and doesn’t understand why he left her again.

And while saying Tommy’s feelings about his father’s death are complicated is the understatement to end all understatements, he _does_ know that his father was capable of killing Oliver, and would have if given the chance.

He can’t hate Oliver for keeping himself alive. He can hate Oliver for not telling him the truth, for _never_ wanting to tell him the truth, and he can hate Oliver for the secrets and the lies to _everyone_ , but it’s all hollow. It eats at him, and it scrapes at his soul. He’s not fond of the sensation.

Besides, if he looks in the mirror while he’s angry, the face staring back at him is _Malcolm’s_ , and that is unacceptable.

“All right,” he tells Felicity. “Where is he?”

He doesn’t like her answer, but then, he suspects she doesn’t like it much either.

Especially when it means jumping out of a plane.

Tommy, Felicity, and John Diggle land on the beach of _Lian Yu_ and trek through an overwhelming amount of jungle before an unfortunate step of Felicity’s causes them to stop. John stays calm, but Tommy feels like there’s no way on earth he could possibly suck enough air into his lungs.

The last thing he expects is a shirtless Oliver swinging down from the trees like he’s _Tarzan_ and pulling Felicity off of the land mine before it can explode.

When they stand up and Oliver’s taken a moment to make sure Felicity is okay—Tommy can tell by the way his hand lingers on her shoulder before sliding down her arm, coupled with the way Oliver frowns and draws his eyebrows together—John and Tommy hike over.

Oliver’s clearly pissed, but none of it is directed at Felicity. Instead, he points a finger at John and snaps, “You shouldn’t have come. You shouldn’t have _brought_ them here.”

“I’m flattered that you think I’m the ringleader here, Oliver,” John says.

Oliver turns to Tommy by the time John is halfway through that sentence, but Tommy cuts Oliver off before Oliver can turn his irritation on him. “Seriously, Oliver? There’s a whole world out there and you come back _here_?”

Oliver lets out a huff of breath and turns away.

“Could you at least pretend like you’re glad to see us?” Felicity asks. “We spent weeks tracking you down, we traveled halfway across the world, and this morning we flew in a plane so old I’m pretty sure I was safer when I jumped out of it—

“Screaming,” Tommy adds. “Loudly.”

She gives him an annoyed look. Tommy holds up his hands in mock surrender and lets her continue.

Before she can, Oliver has a hand on her shoulder. Her mouth snaps shut. His tone is gentle when he says, “I am happy to see you.”

“You could act like it,” Tommy can’t help but point out, although really, Felicity is the only one of them Oliver actually _is_ acting happy to see.

Now, Oliver looks at him. “I failed,” he says softly. “I couldn’t stop what Malcolm was planning, and people got hurt. Besides, the way I stopped him…”

He can’t seem to bear to look at Tommy anymore.

Tommy hadn’t spent much time contemplating the fact that Felicity could be right about Oliver leaving because of him, but this confirms it.

“You did what you had to do,” Tommy says firmly. “I can see that, Oliver. If you’re here seeking some kind of absolution or penance, you don’t need to be. You can come home.”

Oliver turns away, but Tommy reaches for his shoulder. “Come _home_ , Oliver.”

And, miracle of miracles, Oliver does.

 


	2. PART ONE: CHAPTER TWO

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver has quite a few things to sort out upon his return to Starling.

Felicity Smoak catches Oliver Queen completely off-guard from the moment he meets her. She is, without question, unbearably, unmistakably _real_. She’s genuine in a way that is impossible to fake. And it’s almost dangerous how attractive he finds that.

It’s equally dangerous just how quickly he comes to _need_ her—in both areas of his life. Putting Felicity in charge of Research and Development at QC raises a few eyebrows, but Oliver ignores them. Felicity is bright and passionate. She understands the intricacies of hardware and software, a skill that helps out Oliver’s nightly activities as well as his daily ones. Technology moves forward by leaps and bounds in the span of one year, so essentially missing out on five is crippling when so much of his mission relies on intelligence gathering.

He is under no circumstances supposed to fall in love with her. She is a partner, an asset, a _friend_.

There is no room for her to be anything more. Helena taught him that. Laurel taught him that. Sara, Shado, and McKenna taught him that. Being close to Oliver Queen means being close to danger.

But _Felicity_.

Felicity who believed in him so much she dragged him back to Starling, shoved him through the door of a refurbished lair, and grinned when he opened the case with his new bow inside and told her it was _perfect_.

Returning to Starling means figuring out how to stand under the weight of a different responsibility. Hero carries with it a heavier burden than vigilante. CEO of Queen Consolidated carries a heavier burden than owner of Verdant.

He tells himself it’s temporary. He’ll convince Walter to come back. He’ll find someone better suited for the position as soon as Stellmoor is no longer a threat.

He’s not Tommy. Robert wasn’t Malcolm. Oliver possesses a stronger connection to QC, to what was supposed to be his father’s legacy. So even though he hates it, he goes back. Tries to save the sinking ship.

Standing on a rooftop and seeing Sara Lance standing in front of him alive and breathing unsettles the ground beneath his feet. For a moment he questions _everything._ His time on the island, his time in Starling, his _sanity_.

But no, she’s there, and she’s _real_. Helping her come home soothes some anguish deep inside him, like this big, catastrophic failure from years ago has been rectified.

_I would bring your sister home if I could_ , he’d once told Laurel. And now he _can_.

Sara and Felicity take a little time to warm up to each other, but once they _do_ , they’re inseparable. Oliver starts getting used to jogging down the staircase and finding Sara teaching Felicity on the sparring mats about as often as he expects to see Felicity working at her computers.

Oliver likes knowing that Felicity is getting better at handling herself. With Sara around, the need for her to do the undercover work she’s done in the past—infiltrating the casino, sneaking into Merlyn Global—has diminished, but not completely. There’s always the chance she could be hurt, especially the closer she gets to him and the closer he gets to her.

And he _is_ feeling closer to her. This lovely, warm feeling fills him when he sees her now, when she rambles, when she jokes with him, when she makes him _smile_.

He knows what it is, has felt it many times in the past. Love is different each time, for each person, but Oliver’s never been blind to it, never been oblivious of the direction his heart moves. He is, on occasion, intentionally obtuse, intentionally inclined to minimize the depth of his feelings in order to avoid relationships or repercussions.

And starting something of that nature with _Felicity_? The very idea is incredible and terrifying. The former thought pushes him towards it, the latter makes him back away.

They start carefully, but they do _start,_ and that’s the important thing. Felicity stands in the middle of Oliver’s office at Queen Consolidated with the Count’s needles against her neck, and Oliver makes a decision that changes everything. Three arrows slam into the Count’s chest. The glass behind him shatters as he stumbles backwards. Oliver watches just long enough to make sure he’s really fallen—really _gone—_ then hurries to check on Felicity.

She’s kneeling on the floor, her head down. Shattered glass litters the area around her. Oliver is careful as he kneels in front of her. “You’re alright,” he tells her softly. “You’re safe.”

He looks at her for a long moment, and she looks back at him with worried eyes. Grabbing his arm, Felicity whispers, “You’re shot.”

“Hey,” he whispers, cupping her cheek with his gloved hand. “It’s nothing.”

Carefully, he helps her to her feet. Her legs are wobbly. He holds onto her elbows and tries not to think about how she reaches for his upper arms to steady herself.

His control over his own emotions is unraveling at a frightening speed. It started the moment he answered his phone expecting to hear Felicity’s voice and heard the Count’s instead. It’s built up steadily since then.

And that’s why, even though Oliver knows he needs to get out of here, even though he knows he needs to get back to Thea and Tommy and his mother’s trial, even though he knows that the Count falling down to the street below with arrows in his chest will have the police rushing here, he can’t quite let go of Felicity just yet.

She doesn’t pull away when he wraps his arm around her body, pressing the length of his forearm against her lower back. She leans in, slipping an arm up around his neck, and the other around his ribs.

She’s so close, and his head's still spinning with thoughts of those needles sinking into her skin. Without really thinking about it, Oliver ducks his head down. He’s not consciously angling for a kiss. He’s just trying to get a little closer, get a better view of her face. Keep making sure she’s okay.

She’s tilting her head up, he’s leaning down, and their lips meet in a kiss that is practically inevitable. It lasts for a fraction of a moment, the gentlest, simplest touch.

“Oh,” Felicity says when it’s over, and they’re still so close together that he can feel the wave of her breath on his mouth.

“Yeah,” he manages to say. His voice sounds small and uncertain even to his ears.

“You should go,” she says, and his heart sinks. “I’m okay. I’ll call Lance, and the police will be here soon.”

He presses his lips firmly together. She’s right. “Be careful. Call me back if you need anything.”

She nods. “I will.”

When Oliver makes it back to the lair, he finds Felicity sitting in her usual chair, a grey blanket wrapped around her shoulders. Diggle has clearly been standing guard next to her for the past few hours.

The conversation circles around Moira’s mysterious acquittal for a few moments before Diggle leaves Oliver and Felicity alone.

To escape the awkward silence that springs up once he’s gone, Oliver moves to follow him, but Felicity calls out his name.

He turns. It’s not any trouble to have an excuse to look at her again, to be reminded that the Count really was stopped and that she’s really okay.

“I just wanted to say thank you,” she says. “And I’m sorry.”

He frowns, confused. “For what?”

“I got myself into trouble again, and you… killed him.” Her voice is quiet, anxious. “You killed again and I’m sorry that I was the one to put you in the position where you had to make that kind of choice.”

“Felicity,” he reaches over and takes her hand. There are a million things he could say, a thousand declarations he could make, but his brain simplifies it down to the two thoughts racing through his mind when he’d stood in front of the Count and let go of his bowstring without any hesitation. “He had you, and he was gonna hurt you. There was no choice to make.”

She nods. The slight lift of her left shoulder and the slight tip of her head telegraphs her nervousness. “There’s… another thing we should probably talk about. The Count was threatening me, and he knew who you were, and you were waiting for a verdict for Moira, and I was—well, you know where _I_ was—and Diggle was still detoxing, and I want you to know that if you want to just forget that anything even—”

“Felicity,” he interrupts, setting his other hand on her shoulder.

Her eyes go wide, and he very slowly pulls his hand away.

“I’m bad at this, Felicity,” he tells her. “I don’t think I’ve _ever_ been good at it. You’re more than aware of my track record.”

“I know,” she says.

“But…” He takes a deep breath. Oliver has jumped out of an airplane. Several times. No leap has felt as daunting and terrifying as this one. “I don’t want to forget anything.”

“Oh,” she says again, in the same whispery, breathy tone. He sort of likes that he’s made her speechless.

“We don’t—” He presses his thumb against his first and second fingers, rubbing firmly, wanting a bowstring. “We don’t have to talk about it any more right now.”

“You should get back to Thea,” Felicity says quietly, nodding.

“Tommy’s with her right now,” Oliver tells her. “But yes, I should.”

“So we’ll talk later,” she says.

“Yeah,” he agrees. “Later.”

* * *

 

Tommy makes it a point to catch Oliver the second he steps foot inside the door. “Thea’s in the living room with Ben and Jerry’s and _Singing In The Rain_.”

After they got her home, Moira went straight to bed, and Tommy instigated their semi-regular movie night in an effort to help Thea calm down. Musicals usually did the trick, especially if he sang along with them.

She’s settled down some, which is why Tommy could tuck another blanket around her shoulders and kiss her forehead and tell her he’d be back.

“We need to talk,” Tommy says, and Oliver nods.

There isn’t an easy way to say what he needs to say to Oliver, so Tommy just goes for it.

“I think Thea might be my sister,” Tommy tells Oliver, at the same time Oliver says, “I kissed Felicity.”

Oliver’s declaration might have a bit more of an impact if Tommy hadn’t spent the past few hours adding two-plus-two and hoping they weren’t going to equal four.

They speak again at the same time. “You think Thea’s your sister?” “You kissed Felicity?”

There’s a long pause.

“You go first,” Oliver says finally. “What is this about Thea?”

“I’ve been doing the math,” Tommy says. “When Moira confessed to being with my—with _him_ , plus when Thea was born… She wouldn’t tell me. One way or the other. And I asked her directly.”

Tommy’s aware that Moira’s evasion could be a _no_ , but it could also very easily be a _yes._ He’d expected heartbreak or sorrow in her eyes. What he saw was fury. Disgust. At him or at his father, Tommy doesn’t know.

It’s obvious the exact moment what Tommy is saying hits Oliver. He takes a step back, tilting his head up toward the ceiling and blowing a stream of air through pursed lips. Tommy gives him a second to process.

“Unfortunately for her,” Oliver says. “We have everything we need to find out the truth on our own. Talk to Thea. We can do a DNA test.”

“What if…” Tommy hesitates. He’s trusted Oliver a lot, but thanks to his father’s undertaking, things he once only alluded to he now has to face head-on. “I wouldn’t want to know, if I were her. I wouldn’t want _Malcolm_ to be—”

“She deserves to know the truth, whatever it is. You both do.” Oliver closes his eyes, sways slightly on his feet. He sighs deeply. “But I don’t think the truth is going to change as much about your relationship as you think it will.”

Tommy’s breath catches. That was the best possible thing Oliver could have said.

He looks exhausted, and Tommy remembers what else happened tonight. He’s been pushing it aside all evening, focused on Thea and Moira and his own father, in a weird way. But he’d be lying to himself if he didn’t acknowledge that worry for Felicity and Oliver was present in the back of his mind all night. “How’s our girl?”

“Alive.” Oliver falls back against the door. “A little shaken. Otherwise unharmed.”

“She’s shaken?” Tommy asks. “Or _you’re_ shaken?”

“Both,” Oliver answers. “If I had… If I had hesitated a second longer, I would have lost her.”

“But you didn’t,” Tommy grabs Oliver’s shoulder. “You didn’t hesitate, and she’s _okay_.”

His eyes drift, and Tommy wonders where his best friend just went. To the island? To a different night wearing the hood? To the CNRI building falling apart around them? “Oliver?”

“I killed him,” Oliver says roughly, pressing the heels of his hands against his forehead. “I put three arrows in him to keep him from hurting her. And when I came back I said that I would never—”

He ducks his head down, hiding his face. Tommy waits. Once Oliver seems to have gotten a grip on his emotions, he looks back up.

“You _saved her_ ,” Tommy corrects. “And if given the choice, would you do it again? Spare him and lose her?” He knows which he would choose. It’s Felicity. Losing her is… unthinkable.

Behind his hands, Oliver nods.

“Good.” Tommy decides the best thing for Oliver is to simply act like the matter is settled until Oliver chooses to bring it up again. “At what point during the evening did you kiss her?”

He hesitates. Finally: “When I was making sure she was okay.”

Of course, Tommy thinks. The second his guard was down he gave in to something he’s wanted for a while now. “What are you going to do about it?”

Oliver’s mouth opens. He looks like he’s trying to find words, but then he closes it again without saying anything.

“Oliver,” Tommy says sharply. “The woman _jumped out of a plane_ to bring you home. You look at her like… I don’t even know.” His brain wants to fill in _like you look at me_ , but instead what comes out is: “Like she is the most important thing in your world.”

“Because of the life that I lead, I just think it’s better to not be with someone that I could really care about,” Oliver says softly.

Tommy laughs echos through the room. “Well then, you’re an idiot. What’s the point in being with someone you don’t really care about? You and I both know you’re not wired that way. And trying to make yourself something you’re not, where your _heart_ is concerned? Oliver. You’re just going to be miserable.”

“I can’t ask her to—

“What?” Tommy interrupts. “Be a part of this life? Look around. She’s been a part of this for almost a _year_. She’s not running. So why are you?”

Oliver stares at him. “I don’t know.”

“Talk to her,” Tommy says. “You talk to her about everything else. Why not this?”

“I’ll talk to her,” Oliver agrees. Off of Tommy’s look he says, “I _will_.”

Thea comes out of the living room then, and both of them go silent. “I paused the movie,” she tells Tommy. “Got to your favorite part.”

“Thanks,” he tells her gently.

She turns to Oliver, and her calm demeanor ramps up to anger in a split-second. “Where _were_ you?”

“Thea—” Tommy begins, wanting to somehow defend Oliver, but at the same time not having the ability to explain.

“I’m sorry,” Oliver tells her. “It was an emergency.”

Thea scowls. “An emergency that takes precedence over our own _mother_?”

“I can’t give you details,” Oliver says. “It’s not my place. But it was life or death, Thea. Please believe me.”

She looks at Tommy. “You know?”

Silently, he nods.

“And you think he did the right thing?”

“Thea,” Tommy says very carefully. “I _know_ Oliver did the right thing.”

She runs for Oliver then, crashes into him in a fierce hug. Oliver glances at Tommy over Thea’s head. “Speedy. We need to ask you something.”

“Okay,” she says, stepping back and tucking her hair back behind her ears. “What’s going on?”

Tommy is glad Oliver seems to know what to say, because all the words are stuck in a huge knot in his throat.

“Would you be willing to have a DNA test done?”

Thea tips her head to one side, “Why would I—”

She glances over at Tommy, and her eyes go wide. “Oh.”

“We just,” Tommy reaches for her arm. “We think it would be better to _know_.”

“Couldn’t mom just tell…” Thea stops, shaking her head. “No, I guess she wouldn’t even if she could.”

Tommy exchanges a look with Oliver. Neither of them are in a position to trust that Moira will just hand over the truth, not when she fought so long and so hard to keep it buried.

It makes Tommy wonder what other secrets she’s keeping hidden away. But all he says is, “Thank you, Thea.”

“You want to protect me,” she says. “I get it.”

“Trust me,” Tommy says, giving Oliver a pointed glance. “Sometimes the truth is the best protection there is.”

* * *

Sleep eludes Felicity that night. It’s at least partially the fault of the adrenaline, but she’d be lying to herself if she didn’t also acknowledge the other reason.

Oliver’s lips were soft, off-set by the scratch of his stubble against her mouth. Her heart was beating so rapidly she wasn’t quite sure the Count _hadn’t_ slipped her a hint of Vertigo.

But it’s not just the kiss. The kiss itself was lovely, simple. It’s the implications of the kiss that are complicated.

And Felicity’s mind loves examining things that are complicated. She just wishes it wouldn’t do so in lieu of _sleep_.

She’s past denying a certain degree of feeling towards Oliver. That’s nothing new. Since the moment he wandered into her office with the most ridiculous of stories, Felicity was intrigued by the mystery that was Oliver Queen.

Finding out he was the hooded vigilante raised more questions than it answered. Every mark on his body—and there are many—tells a story Felicity’s never heard.

More than that though, Oliver’s mission, his presence in her life, changes something inside Felicity. It’s a catalyst that makes everything she’s done up until that point make sense.

In college, she wanted to change the world. When the world didn’t want to change the way she thought it needed to, she let it change her. She never really regretted that. But helping Oliver’s crusade has given her a purpose and fulfillment that she never had in her office at QC. He may never know how much she owes him for that.

Her usual routine to fall back asleep—a late night _The X Files_ marathon and a cup of hot tea—does nothing to slow down her mind. She dozes, eventually, but she’s wide awake again when the sun starts to rise. Going for a run is tempting, but that’s not what she really thinks she _needs_.

What she wants is to put her hands on something, to piece something together from broken pieces. She dresses quickly. It’s Saturday, no need to go into work, so Felicity grabs jeans and a blouse, and slides her feet into her favorite panda flats.

Lately, the foundry has felt more like home than her own townhouse. Her computer system hums as she wakes it up, settling into her usual chair and taking a moment to use a push of her toes to spin around.

She was right. Her brain wanted a problem. It takes only a few minutes for her to sink into her work, letting it overtake every spare bit of brainpower she has. It settles her in the way few other things can.

It’s no wonder, then, that she doesn’t hear Oliver come in. They are, of course, alike enough that they seek solitude and comfort in the same way.

“Hey,” Oliver says. There’s something supremely unfair about how attractive he looks in a pair of dark jeans and a navy sweater.

Felicity scoots back in her chair. “Hi,” she says. “Couldn’t sleep either?”

He shakes his head. Picking up one of his tennis balls, he throws it against the concrete floor and catches is as it bounces up.  “Between the trial and the Count and… Tommy thinks Thea might be Malcolm’s daughter.”

She raises her eyebrows and purses her lips. “Scary thing about that is how right the timing is.”

“And then...” The tennis ball is keeping a steady _thump_ against the floor and then a _snap_ when it jumps back into Oliver’s hand. He looks right at her, and she can’t read his expression. “...then there’s you.”

Her heartbeat quickens. She may have said ‘later’, but she never really thought they’d get back to it. She assumed that as soon as they talked it would be over. It’s why she was hoping to avoid the talking.

“If you’re having second thoughts—” she starts.

“What?” Oliver’s brows furrow in confusion. “No. I’m not. I—”

Quickly, he moves in front of her, kneeling down. He takes her hands in his. “Felicity… I’m not having second thoughts. I know what I want. What I am concerned about has nothing to do with how I feel about you.”

She tightens her hold on his hands. “What are you concerned about?”

He takes a deep breath. “Losing you. That you’ll get caught in the crossfire, that I won’t be able to protect you.”

“Both of those things happened tonight, Oliver. And I’m still here.”

His eyes close. He bows his head. She can tell he’s struggling with words, and although she waits a few moments for him, eventually his silence is too much.

“Which do you think is better?” she asks. “To have what we both want for a little while but lose it, or to deny ourselves out of fear and lose each other anyway?”

Felicity knows better than anyone how much it can hurt to miss something you’ve never had. A father, for instance. This, this possibility of _something_ with Oliver is absolutely something she’ll miss. Even now she’s scared he’ll decide she’s not worth the risk—of his life, of his mission, of his heart.

“I just want you to know what you’re getting into.” Oliver shifts closer to her. “The life that I live. The things that I _do_. The things that I have _done_ …”

It strikes her then that the vigilante—the _Arrow_ —is kneeling in front of her. He is, in every sense of the word, _dangerous_. Deadly. But Felicity hasn’t spent the past year falling for the Arrow. She hasn’t spent it falling for _the_ infamous playboy Oliver Queen. The person she’s falling for is the one who stands at the point where those two identities intersect. The one who kissed her in Queen Consolidated, dressed in green but with the hood gone and his face clearly visible.

“You don’t know what I’ve done,” she says softly. “There are things in my past too. Maybe they aren’t as Shakespearean, but they’re _there_. This isn’t about your past. This is about you right now. And I really like who that person is. You stand up against injustice. You protect people. You _love_ people.”

He smiles up at her, and a warm, pleasant feeling blooms in Felicity’s chest. He’s looking at her like she’s—well, everything.

~~~~“You’re extraordinary,” he tells her. “Absolutely extraordinary.”

She has the sudden urge to lean over, touch his hair, splay her fingers against the back of his neck, kiss his forehead. There’s something deeply satisfying about him looking up at her like this, with unspoken adoration in his eyes. It’s always been there, really, but now his guard is down and _wow_.

How often has she looked at Oliver without actually _seeing_?

Oliver stands, keeping hold of Felicity’s hands. The slight tug encourages her to stand to her feet as well. “Felicity. Let me take you out to dinner.”

“Okay,” she says with a smile.

“Italian?” he lifts an eyebrow. “Everybody likes Italian, right?”

His nervousness is endearing. It’s so rare to see Oliver flustered. It makes her feel special. He _likes_ her. A year ago she’d never have believed it.

“I like Italian,” Felicity reassures him with a smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for such a great response to the first chapter. Next update should be on March 17th.


	3. PART ONE: CHAPTER THREE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tommy and Felicity have a conversation; Oliver and Felicity have a date.

Tommy considers Felicity a friend sooner than she likely considers him one. She brought him a ‘get well’ teddy bear and that sealed her fate. The more time he spends getting to know her, the more he just genuinely likes her.

At first it’s just the occasional end-of-day drink. They both work either in or under a bar, the woman _adores_ a good glass of red wine, and Tommy likes finding good vintages. By the time the Arrowcave is closed for the night, so is Verdant—which is likely exactly how Oliver planned it. Felicity is the one who comes upstairs and sits at the bar and tells him about her day.

At first, he wonders if it’s just because he’s one of the only people who knows her greatest secret, but eventually he decides she just likes talking to _him_.

And that is an _incredible_ feeling.

“What ever happened,” she asks him one night over a glass of one of Tommy’s favorite vintages, “between you and Laurel?”

He stares at her, trying to stomp down the bitterness that still washes over him when he thinks about that. He wishes it wouldn’t, but he’s all-too-often powerless to stop it. He almost had everything he always wanted, but—

“I wasn’t Oliver,” he tells her softly.

“And that was a dealbreaker?” She fidgets on her barstool. “For her or for you?”

“Both, I think,” he answers, pouring himself another glass. “But more for me.”

Felicity stares at the bottom of her glass. “Because she still loves him? Or because he still loves her?”

“Because I’m screwed up just enough to be unable to comprehend not living in his shadow,” Tommy says, “And she was smart enough to know she didn’t deserve that.”

Felicity takes a sip of her wine. “So she let you go?”

He thinks about that for a moment. “I think we let each other go.”

Nodding thoughtfully, she lets the conversation drift elsewhere, and he’s grateful.

Other conversations touch on different subjects. They talk about Oliver a lot. Tommy finds it helpful to discuss the differences in his friend with someone who has only ever known him as he is now.

The first time Tommy sees Felicity after her encounter with Count Vertigo, he can’t help but wrap her up in a hug. She holds on just as long and tightly as he does. It’s early enough in the afternoon that Verdant is empty, but Tommy already feels like he’s been awake forever, between worrying about the results of Thea’s DNA test and realizing just how close Felicity came to dying the night before.

“You’re okay?” he whispers into her hair.

He feels her nod against his chest. “It was a long night,” she says, “But I’m okay.”

“Did you sleep at _all_?” he asks as the hug breaks.

She makes a face.

“That’s a no,” Tommy says. “You should go home and rest.”

“Everything’s just been so _busy_.” She taps her temple with her forefinger. “Up here. I couldn’t stop _thinking_. And then I saw Oliver and he gave me even more to think about.”

Tommy avoids her gaze. “He told me about, well…”

It’s not that he’s upset, or jealous. He knows what it is to be jealous of Oliver. This is not it.

But for a little while, he’d been blind to Oliver’s burgeoning feelings for Felicity. It was denial. Tommy should have realized a lot sooner, but he’d stupidly assumed that Oliver and Laurel would make another go at it.

He was wrong. Oliver had already let Laurel go. He just failed to see it.

So the tiny speck inside him that looks at Felicity and sees _maybe_ , that needs to go. The sooner the better, because Tommy has already walked down this road once, and he can’t do it again. He won’t.

But sometimes he looks at Felicity and feels the same ache in his chest that he once did for Laurel. _The right girl_.

But both of them are the wrong girl. Laurel’s busy dating the guy who owns the gym she frequents—Ted something—and the huge _maybe_ in Felicity’s life is _Oliver_. Tommy’s known that almost from the start. He doesn’t think it’ll take Oliver very long to move forward now that he’s been given a push. Oliver’s head might be his greatest enemy in matters of the heart, but once he gives himself permission… he goes after what he wants.

Tommy almost envies that about him. Tommy’s far too inclined to dance around his own desires, only moving forward in half-measures and nervous steps forward, always scared what he wants is going to be snatched away from him as soon as he tries to touch it.

“He asked me out to dinner,” Felicity says softly.

Tommy ducks his head, disguising the painful expression on his face with a nod.

“I said yes.” There’s a nervousness about her now. An anxiety. One of their conversations flows back to him in pieces, and he realizes what he’s looking at. It’s something he sees sometimes when he looks in the mirror. For whatever reason, Felicity is scared she’s going to lose him.

Right then and there, he vows that she won’t. “I’m glad,” he manages to say. “It was about time Oliver pulled his head out of his ass.”

She smiles hopefully at him. “I’m just… I’m nervous everything is going to change.”

“It will,” he tells her—not to break her heart, but because it’s true. “But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I think Oliver could use some good changes, and I think that’s what you’ll be.”

She gives him a long look that he isn’t quite sure how to interpret. For just a second he can see _everything_ with her. Omelets. Mornings. Companionship. Long talks over bottles of wine.

And for the first time, Tommy wonders if Felicity Smoak has held onto two _maybes_ for the past few months. Oliver is one of them.

But the other is him.

“Okay,” she says, giving his arm a squeeze. “I’m going to get home and try to sleep… _again_.”

“I hope you do,” Tommy says. He watches as she leaves, then turns to the bar and pours himself a stiff drink.

* * *

Considering the numerous interruptions that arise in their line of work, the fact that Oliver and Felicity’s dinner date goes off without a hitch is a miracle.

Felicity’s not sure what she’s expecting—explosions? daring escapes? an attempted kidnapping?—but they smile shyly at each other over plates of incredible pasta and the most amazing melt-in-your-mouth hot buttered breadsticks in existence. Felicity strongly considers sneaking a few out in her purse.

It takes them a little while to settle into a comfortable conversation, for them to stop dancing around each other and just speak honestly. In many ways, the night feels like an extension of the way they talk normally, just with the inclusion of topics they usually avoid.

They talk about the island. They talk about Felicity’s childhood. Not just about what happened during those times in their lives, but how they _felt_ , how it changed them.

Oliver orders a _divine_ bottle of red wine, and at the end of the night they share a dessert—Felicity forgets what they even order, but it’s rich and chocolatey and creamy.

She’s giddy as Oliver walks her up to her door. His hand is rough and warm against hers. Comforting.

“We did it,” Felicity tells him as they climb her front steps. “We made it through an actual _date_. Without getting sidetracked by any…” She waves a hand around for emphasis. “Emergencies.”

He shifts his stance in a way that casually puts him right in her personal space. “We did.”

Felicity momentarily loses the ability to draw breath. When he looks at her like that, a careful smile on his lips and hope in his eyes, it wipes away her doubt and trepidation. His hope, small as it is, makes hers stronger.

Whispering her name, Oliver skims the fingertips of his free hand across her jawline. She tilts her chin up, anticipating, waiting, wanting his kiss.

He ducks his head down and brings his mouth to hers. Felicity isn’t quite sure what she was expecting, but the fireworks show that ensues _delivers_. This kiss is nothing like the first one. This is heated, passionate. It thrills Felicity down to her toes. Oliver’s embrace is tight, his arms locked around her ribcage in a way that feels safe rather than imposing. She presses her hands to his chest, tugs just a little at his tie.

Her body is practically buzzing when the kiss ends; her breathing is ragged. Her heart is racing in her chest.

“Wow,” she whispers, eyes still closed.

“Yeah,” Oliver says. His lips brush against hers one more time; he bites gently at her bottom lip.

She’s struck by the fact that she could just… invite him in. She could unlock her front door and drag him inside by his tie, shove him against the nearest wall and tear his clothes off.

But as much as her body is screaming at her to do it, and her heart _wants_ it, alarm bells are blaring in her head.

This is too fast. This is _too_ fast.

She could give him _everything_ , all the pieces of her heart, let him into all the cracks and crevices, and then he could turn around and _leave her_.

The terror from that thought is enough to force her backward, out of Oliver’s arms. She tries to disguise the slip, unzipping her purse and fumbling for her keys, but Oliver catches on immediately. He covers her shoulders with his hands and slowly rubs down her arms to her elbows.

“Hey,” he says softly. “Did I do something wrong?”

He looks so worried and uncertain that she’s quick to shake her head. “No,” she tells him. “It’s me. It’s just…”

Figuring out how to say what she wants to say is a bit tricky, but finally she comes up with: “You may have noticed that I don’t talk a lot about my parents.” Except tonight. She’d mentioned her mother tonight, growing up in Vegas and counting cards and building computers, but she’d meticulously avoided the reason her dad wasn’t in the picture. It was stupid, but part of her wondered… if she told Oliver how easy she was to leave, if she’d plant the idea in his head.

He gives her the tiniest of smiles. “I have noticed that.”

“I don’t really know what my father is, cause he abandoned us.” She lifts one shoulder in a half-hearted shrug. “I barely remember him, but I do remember how much it hurt when he left. And just the thought of losing someone that important to me again—”

“Hey,” his tone is _so_ gentle it brings tears to her eyes, and she winces because she really doesn’t want to cry. Not after tonight was so amazingly wonderful. “You’re not going to lose me. I’m...” he swallows. “I’m right _here_. I have run away from a lot of things in my life, but I’m not running from this, from _you_.”

She nods. “I’m sorry. This date was ending a lot better than I thought it would and then I opened my mouth.”

He frowns at her, almost looking insulted. “How did you think it was going to go?”

“Explosions?” she tries, her voice oddly high as she tries to sound lighthearted. “Definitely explosions. Or… y’know, just various other Arrow-related interruptions. I didn’t think we’d get _here_. At my doorway...” She’s helpless to stop her blush. “Saying goodnight.”

“We don’t have to say goodnight,” he tells her lowly. “Not for a while at least.”

“If we put it off,” she shifts on her feet. “I have a feeling we’ll be saying good _morning_.”

“Would that be so bad?” he asks.

Felicity is fairly certain that under no circumstances could waking up in bed with Oliver be bad. “As long as you’re _there_. As long as you _stay_.”

He takes her hand and kisses her knuckles. “I’ll be there. I’ll stay, Felicity. I promise.”

It could be his tone or his expression, but she believes him. She tugs at his hand. “Come inside?”

“I’d love to,” he says.

She _doesn’t_ push him up against the wall and tear his clothes off, but she _does_ tug on his tie a little bit to coax him over the threshold.

“Coffee?” she starts to ask, but he steps forward, puts his hands to her hips, and kisses her.

Felicity hums against his mouth, moving backward, pulling him along with her towards the staircase. Her ankles hit the back of the steps, and she loses her balance. Oliver grabs onto her to keep her from falling, and, laughing lightly, she lowers herself down so she can sit on the fourth step.

Without missing a beat, Oliver kneels in front of her and takes off her shoes. They’re these gorgeous black pumps with ribbon criss-crossed around her ankle. Oliver pulls at the ends of the ribbon to undo the bow and gently loosens the knot. His fingers brush against her skin as he unwraps the ribbon and gently pulls off her shoe. He does the right, then the left. When he’s finished, he leans forward and leaves kisses along the insides of her thighs as he shoves the short skirt of her dress up her legs.

Putting her hands on his shoulders, Felicity pushes him back a little. She crooks a finger around the knot of his tie and wiggles it a bit to loosen it. He watches her patiently while she pulls it up and over his head. When she begins undoing the buttons of his shirt, Oliver removes his suit jacket and folds it neatly, placing it on the floor next to Felicity’s shoes.

After undoing three buttons, she lifts her hands and strokes her thumbs across his temples. Oliver closes his eyes and bows his head, and the only word Felicity can think of to describe the expression on his face is _surrender_.

“We should find a bed,” she tells him.

Oliver rocks back, pushing himself onto his feet. He takes her hands and helps her stand. “Lead the way,” he tells her.

She does; he follows quietly. Felicity stops outside her bedroom door. Oliver’s fingers find the zipper of her dress. He draws it down as far has he can—three quarters of the way down her back—and slips his hands beneath the material to slide the dress down her arms. Once her arms are free, Felicity braces her palms against the door, sighing contentedly as Oliver kisses his way down the ridge of her spine, unhooking her bra on the way down. He drags her skirt down her legs, runs his hands over her thighs.

Dropping her head against the door, Felicity reaches down and twists the knob. The two of them practically fall forward into the room. Felicity tosses her bra aside and twists around, grabbing at Oliver’s shirt.

“Off,” she tells him, unaffected by the buttons she accidently pops off as she yanks at it.

He chuckles, but helps her, shucking off his shirt and undoing his belt. Felicity falls back on the bed, watching.

Oliver slows his movements down. The shirt is already on the floor, but he takes his time pulling off his belt, toeing off his shoes, tugging down his pants, removing his socks.

When he finishes, Oliver pauses. His eyes drift appreciatively down her body, and Felicity squirms a little.

“You’re beautiful,” he tells her. His hand cups her knee, fingertips inching up her thigh, then slowly dragging back down. She gasps and shudders, and he does it again. “So beautiful, Felicity.”

Felicity studies him. She isn’t sure if she should pay attention to his scars or ignore them. If she draws attention to them, by touching them or kissing them, will it make Oliver close up? Shut down?

But if she ignores them, she’s ignoring part of him.

As Oliver moves to kneel on the mattress, Felicity scoots back to give him room. She keeps herself in a sitting position and reaches forward to touch her fingers to the ridges of the curved scar on his left side. She looks him right in the eye as she does. It’s a question: _Is this okay?_

Oliver covers her hand with his and nods, so Felicity keeps going. She kisses the scar from his duel with Malcolm Merlyn, and the long gash across his ribs. She doesn’t _linger_. She doesn’t make this moment about anything other than simple acceptance and affection.

After a bit, Felicity lies back down, letting her hand trail down the length of Oliver’s arm to his wrist as she does.

“C’mere,” she says, crooking a finger on her opposite hand at him. She doesn’t have to tell him twice. He climbs carefully on top of her, bracing his forearms on the mattress to her right and to her left. Oliver ducks his head down and kisses beneath her jaw, taking a moment to tug on her earlobe with his teeth and then kiss his way down her neck and across her collarbone. Felicity lifts her hips to meet his as he grinds against her, loving and hating the slow pace all at once.

At one point, she’d had the vague imaginings of having sex with Oliver as it being some quick, impassioned affair, before certain death or in the heat of the moment. This is _nice_ slow. It feels intentional, purposeful.

They’re not making the most of a little time or scratching an itch. This _means_ something.

That thought is more thrilling than the pulse of arousal between her legs.

“Felicity.” Oliver’s voice is a little strained. His hand slides beneath her panties, and she can’t stop her hips from bucking against the touch of his fingers. “Felicity.” He rests his forehead against hers, presses a quick kiss against her lips. “I want—”

His fingers play expertly against her, slow, teasing circles. Felicity’s brain short-circuits for a moment on the mix of satisfaction and pleasure sweeping through her. It’s just what she needs, and somehow she still wants more.

“I want to take my time with you,” he says. “I do.”

And she suddenly understands exactly what he’s saying.

“Round two,” she tells him, imagining for just a moment the joy of waking up with his head between her thighs. “I promise. Right now I want you inside me.”

The look he gives her is filled with such relief that she can’t help taking his face in her hands and kissing him. The hand not between her legs slides underneath her back, pressing her firmly against him. She can feel how ready he is.

A thrill of excitement shoots through her. She bends her knees, pressing her feet flat against the bed, spreading her thighs wider. As Oliver pulls back, Felicity follows him by sitting up, holding onto his neck. Oliver chuckles warmly against her lips. It’s only when he starts pulling her underwear down her legs that she lets herself let go of his neck and drop back to the mattress.

When Oliver looks like he’s going to lean down and kiss her again, Felicity lifts her leg and presses the ball of her foot to his chest. “Yours too.”

He pretty much has to stand up to take off his boxers, but Felicity doesn’t really mind, because it means she gets to look at him more. That reminds her—

“Jewelry box,” Felicity tells him, breathless. “On the dresser. Bottom right drawer.”

Gingerly, Oliver opens the drawer and pulls out a string of condoms. Ripping one off the line, he moves back over to her. Scooting to the edge of the bed to meet him, Felicity takes it. She’s careful as she opens it, as she pinches the tip and rolls it on.

Once it’s in place, she tilts her head up to kiss Oliver, wrapping her arms around his neck. He holds her impossibly close, runs his hands down her spine.

Moving forward as he breaks the kiss, Oliver lowers her back down to the bed. She watches with her lower lip caught between her teeth as he kisses her stomach, her ribs, her breasts. The scruff of his beard scrapes against her skin, but it’s a sharp contrast to the warmth of his mouth.

Impatient, Felicity gives his hair a sharp tug. He obeys her immediately, moving into a better position, reaching down to circle her clit with his thumb. She whines, moving her hips, rubbing against him, spurned on by the quiet groan he makes.

He tucks her hair behind her ear, lightly kisses her lips, and whispers her name as he slides inside her.

It’s been a while, and it’s a lot. Felicity doesn’t fight the urge to close her eyes and just feel.

“Felicity?” he asks, his voice strained.

She realizes he’s waiting for her to look at him, to acknowledge him, to tell him he’s okay. That he’s not hurting her.

Opening her eyes, Felicity makes sure she’s looking directly at Oliver. She brushes her fingertips across his forehead. “Hey,” she says.

“Hi,” he tells her, and then he _smiles_. It reaches all the way up to his eyes.

Oliver’s smiles are so rare, so precious, that it makes Felicity want to cry. The evidence of his happiness, _here_ , in bed with her, is overwhelming. She moves her hips, taking him deeper inside her, and he _gasps_ , letting his head fall beside her shoulder, murmuring her name.

His thrusts are shallow and slow. She can feel him, large and strong over her, around her, but so _controlled_. So steady.

“That’s good,” she tells him. “That feels so good.”

The kiss he gives her is sloppy, uncoordinated. The edge of need to it more than makes up for how unpracticed it is, how their lips don’t quite align right.

Felicity doesn’t miss the way Oliver’s breathing changes or how he starts speeding up, losing rhythm, every movement feeling more frantic. His thumb is still on her clit, and the combination of both sensations has her panting and making little noises in the back of her throat.

He touches his hand to her cheek, and she lets her eyes flutter open, looking up at him. He looks a bit like he’s trying to say something, trying to put some intangible emotion into words, but everything else is just too much. Somehow, the look he gives her is all she needs. Felicity digs her nails into Oliver’s shoulders as she comes, cursing and crying out his name.

“Please,” she hears him saying softly, desperately, over and over again. “Please, Felicity.”

Lifting her legs, she presses her heels into his lower back and says, “Come on, Oliver. It’s okay.”

It takes him a few more moments, but then his mouth is dropping open and his forehead is pressed against hers and _damn_ these are sights and sounds that she never wants to forget.

Afterwards, they’re both breathing heavily, staring at each other. “Wow,” Felicity whispers, right before Oliver kisses her softly, framing her face with his hands and slipping his tongue into her mouth.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Oliver Queen is a cuddler, but it does amaze her, just a little. After they’ve taken turns in the bathroom, he wraps his arms around her like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Sprawled across his chest with her hand over his heart, feeling warm and safe and perfectly _wonderful_ , Felicity falls asleep.

In the morning, Felicity wakes up with sunlight streaming through her bedroom window and her thighs hooked over Oliver Queen’s shoulders while his tongue works magic between her legs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next update should hopefully be on March 24th.


	4. PART ONE: CHAPTER FOUR

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tommy Merlyn gets a sister for Christmas.

Tommy Merlyn gets a sister for Christmas. It’s not the puppy he asked his mom for when he was six, but it’s damn close. He sits in the Queen’s living room with Thea and Oliver, and he watches as Thea opens the envelope with trembling hands.

His heart is beating so fast with nervousness that the time Thea spends perusing the envelope’s contents feels like an eternity. After a few moments, she leans over to Oliver, holding out the paper, and quietly asks, “Does that mean what I think it means?”

Tommy feels sick. Thea’s eyes are filled with tears, and Oliver’s face is stony and unreadable.

“You’re my half-brother,” Thea whispers, and Tommy’s secretly glad _that’s_ how she phrases it. _Malcolm is my father_ would have been much harder to hear.

(Malcolm is gone, he reminds himself. He may have been able to hurt Tommy, to hurt Rebecca, but he cannot and will not _ever_ be able to hurt Thea.)

While Tommy’s first impulse is to lunge forward and sweep Thea—his _sister_ —up into a hug, he stamps it down, waits. Oliver’s arm is around Thea’s shoulders, and she leans against him as she cries softly. Tommy wishes he knew the cause for her tears, happiness or sadness or just being overwhelmed, but he feels like his normal ability to read Thea Queen like a book has been broken. He’s never seen these pages before.

Anxiously, Tommy rubs his hands over his knees and stands up. He hates himself for pacing, but there’s too much energy and emotion built up inside him to sit still.

After a few moments, Thea walks up to him shyly, which is an odd look on Thea. She doesn’t lift her face to meet his eyes, but she steps right into his personal space, wraps her arms around his ribs, and holds onto him tightly.

Effortlessly, Tommy returns the hug, dipping his head down to kiss the top of her head affectionately.

“I’m sorry you won a mass-murdering father in the mail today,” he tells her.

His only answer is a sob that evolves into a laugh halfway through.

“I guess that makes me your consolation prize.”

Thea backs away then, pokes him in the chest with her forefinger, and says, “You are grand prize material and grand prize material _only_.”

“So are you,” he says. “I mean that.”

“You’ve been a great older brother my whole life,” Thea says. “I like that it’s official now.”

“Me too,” he agrees.

In the end, it doesn’t change all that much. Tommy and Thea are, in all the ways that matter, still _them_. But it does alter the connection between them, and not in a bad way. Thea asks questions about Malcolm, about what it was like growing up with him.

Tommy doesn’t sugarcoat things. In no world is he allowing Thea Queen to believe anything untrue about their biological father. It leads to him opening up about things the world doesn’t know regarding what really happened behind the closed doors of the Merlyns’ house. Thea learns some things even Oliver doesn’t know.

It strains Thea’s relationship with Moira. All Tommy knows is that the confrontation between the two women on the subject ends with Thea storming out of the house and sleeping on his couch for a week.

They reconcile, but Tommy thinks their relationship will likely never be the same again.

Oliver’s more inclined to forgive Moira, but then, Oliver wasn’t the subject of Moira’s lies and omissions this time.

Thea sleeping on his couch for a few weeks means that he has the perfect opportunity to pester her to come running in the mornings. Tommy usually meets up with Sara and Felicity to take a jog around the park, and when he can, he drags Thea along with them. If she thinks it’s weird that he’s running around with Oliver’s current girlfriend and Oliver’s recently returned-from-the-dead former flame, she doesn’t say anything about it.

“You all training for a marathon or something?” Thea asks the first morning while they wait for Felicity to fix the ties of her shoes.

“Something like that,” Sara says, with a bit of an impish grin.

Tommy’s the one Felicity talks to about Sara. Well, he has a sense that Diggle is another one of Felicity’s major confidants, but Tommy doesn’t really know what Felicity confides in Dig compared to what she confides in him.

But Felicity, like the rest of the world, is aware of the _history_ , and as Tommy very well knows, history can be a very powerful thing. He suspects she talks to him because he is one of the people who was there when it happened, and of the four of them, he’s the one with the least emotional attachment to the situation.

“What do you want to know?” Tommy asks, leaning back in the lair’s spare desk chair and propping his feet up on one of the tables. Oliver and Dig are in the field, and Felicity has their side of the conversation muted.

She shrugs. “I don’t even know what to ask about?”

“Well,” Tommy tries, “Something must have happened that made you want to bring it up?”

“I just was thinking,” Felicity says. “Sara is… better suited for this.”

“Better suited for running the very sophisticated comms system you have got going on here?” He gives her a skeptical look.

“No,” Felicity closes her eyes, pressing her fingertips to her temples. “No. I mean—” She gestures to the room around them—the weapons and computers and equipment strewn about the room. “She’s better suited to handle _this_. This life. These choices. I’m just…”

He waits for her to find the words she wants.

“I’m shaking in the Count’s arms and trying to remember basic self-defence. Which is _ridiculous_ , because I’ve seen _Miss Congeniality_ like twenty times now and I know the whole SING acronym and everything and I still choked, Tommy. Sara would have hit the guy in the Solar-Plexus-Instep-Nose-Groin without even hesitating.”

“You’re not Sara,” he points out. “And I don’t think Oliver expects you to be.”

“But I’m also not…” More hand waving. “Dig keeps taking me to the gun range, and Sara’s been helping me whenever she can, but I don’t feel like I’m picking up what I need to, or that I’m even picking up how to handle myself in those flight or fight situations. I’m not their level of badass.”

He hums. “You don’t have to go through five years in hell to become a badass, Felicity. And you _are_ one.”

“I just…” She shakes her head. “They both walked through something together that I will likely never fully understand. And I don’t _need_ to understand it, I really don’t. And I’m not _jealous_.” She draws in a deep breath and slowly exhales. “I’m just… wondering if they’re better for each other because of that. Oliver doesn’t worry about losing Sara.”

“Excuse me?” Tommy raises an eyebrow. “Like hell he doesn’t.”

Felicity holds up a finger, taps two keys on her keyboard, then says, “Robbery on Tenth and Spruce. Oliver, you’re closest.”

Another few taps and her attention is back on Tommy. “What do you mean?”

“I mean just because he goes into battle with her doesn’t mean he’s not scared she won’t come back alive.” He lets his feet drop off of the table and scoots his chair closer to Felicity. “Trust me. He worries about all of us. He can’t not. But just by being _you_ —by going to the gun range with Dig and sparring with Sara and running all around the town with us at the crack of dawn—you’re reassuring him that you’re going to do everything in your power to keep yourself safe. I don’t think Oliver takes that for granted.”

She looks thoughtful. They’re sitting facing each other, and Tommy reaches across the space between them to take her hand. “It’s Oliver, Felicity. He’d die for any one of us indiscriminately. You know that.”

“I _hate_ that.”

He gives her a look. “Okay,” she relents. “I actually love that about him. Except for the _dying_ part. I’m not fond of that.”

“Me neither,” Tommy says. “But we’re all trying to help him past that. It just takes all of us doing it in our own different ways.”

She smiles at him. “You’re smart,” she says. “I like it.”

There’s a snappy retort on his lips, but it’s at that moment Oliver meets up with his purse-snatcher. The villain flees, and Felicity gets dragged into eye-in-the-sky navigation while he pursues. After the interruption, the conversation moves in another direction, but Tommy doesn’t quite stop turning it over in his head as the weeks go by.

Then the Clock King strikes. And Tommy’s never seen Felicity so rattled.

It’s mostly that he beat her, Tommy concludes. He got into her head and he got into her system. In hindsight, it really shouldn’t surprise him that Felicity’s response to this is an ill-advised foray into the field. It ends with her taking a bullet in the shoulder for Sara Lance and Tommy watching anxiously as Diggle carries her down the Arrowcave’s stairs in his arms.

The three men—Tommy, Oliver, and Dig—turn away while Sara helps patch up Felicity.

Felicity’s slurring something about always wanting to take a bullet for someone when Oliver pulls Tommy aside and asks, “I have to finish up here. Can you get her home?”

Silently, Tommy nods. After Sara finishes the stitches on Felicity’s shoulder, Tommy waits while Oliver walks over to Felicity. The two exchange a few words. Tommy misses the first part, but he clearly hears Felicity say, “I’m just—you’re my guy, you know—and… I’m really glad that you’re my guy.”

Oliver puts his hand to Felicity’s cheek, and she closes her eyes and nods, nuzzling her face against his palm. “Me too,” he says, and Tommy can hear the amusement in his voice.

“You’ll always be my guy,” she tells him, and Tommy’s helpless to stop his smile when she starts quietly singing _You’re The One That I Want_ from _Grease_. She’s _adorable_.

She’s adorable, and she makes Oliver happy. It’s a winning combination, really. “And you’ll always be my girl,” he tells her with a quick kiss to her forehead.

Oliver looks back to Tommy with a wink that tells him it’s time to swoop in.

Tommy moves to stand beside Felicity. “You ready to go home?” he asks her.

She nods, then looks to Oliver. “Tommy’s going to take you,” he says. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“C’mon, Felicity.” Taking care not to jostle her too much, Tommy helps her to her feet. “Let’s go.”

Getting her up the stairs is tricky, not because she’s in pain, but because she’s so _loopy_. She wants to dance suddenly when they’re halfway up the steps, and only Tommy’s quick thinking is enough to snap an arm around her waist keeps her from falling.

“How many aspirins did Dig give you?” he wonders, scooping her up beneath the knees and carrying her up the stairs the rest of the way.

“Not sure,” Felicity says, hiding her face against his chest. “But I feel good.”

Her words are slurred. “I’m sure you do,” Tommy says.

He runs through a drive through on his way back to Felicity’s townhouse to pick up food. He’s not sure what she’ll even eat, but he’s not surprised when she skips past the french fries and goes right for the chocolate shake.

She falls asleep in the car, the styrofoam cup held between her knees. After he pulls the car into her driveway and climbs out, Tommy jogs around to the passenger’s side, puts her shake in the center cupholder, and reaches across Felicity’s body to unbuckle her seatbelt. She groans softly as he twists her body around, pulls her feet out of the car and carefully tugs her forward. “C’mon, Felicity,” he mutters, looping her arms around his neck. “Let’s get you inside.”

He doesn’t quite get the best grip on her, but she wakes up enough to cooperate a little more, tightening her arms around his neck. He changes his goals and manages to carry her up her front steps bridal style, but then he has to set her down again to get her front door unlocked with the keys he’d fished from her purse. She sways on her feet, and he gets the door open as fast as possible, practically dragging her inside.

Getting her upstairs to the bedroom seems impossible, given the circumstances, so Tommy settles for the sofa in her living room. It looks comfy enough. He doesn’t really _want_ to help her undress, but there isn’t another option, and what she’s wearing doesn’t look comfortable. Maybe if he just gets her the clothes she’ll sober up enough to change on her own?

Tommy runs up the stairs but stops short at the entryway of Felicity’s bedroom. He can’t make himself go in. But the door to the right appears to lead to a laundry room, and that doesn’t feel as much like an invasion of privacy. There’s a basket of folded laundry on the floor, and Tommy carefully rifles through it. The best thing he finds is a large tee shirt. It looks like Oliver’s. He figures it will work and grabs it.

Downstairs, Felicity is sprawled across the sofa. She’s on her back, and Tommy worries that when the oxycodone wears off, she’ll wake up in pain because of how she’s sleeping.

He perches on the edge of the sofa cushions and gently rubs her good shoulder. “Felicity.”

A moan.

“Felicity?”

She stirs a little more, and he helps her roll over. “Tommy?” she slurs.

“Yeah, honey.” He catches himself quickly, bites his tongue. He’s called her that a few times during their friendship, but always before she started seeing Oliver. “I’m here.”

She hums. “Hi.”

He smiles at her, and she reaches forward to touch her fingertip to his nose. “You’re _here_.”

“I am,” he says. “Right here.”

“I like your nose,” she tells him, pressing her palm to his face, letting her fingers spread out. “And your _eyes_. Your whole face, really. It’s so _nice_. You have a nice face.”

“Thank you,” he tells her, maneuvering her hands to the buttons on her shirt in an attempt to get her to undress herself. She does, almost out of habit. Tommy averts his eyes as he helps her pull the shirt down her arms. Once it’s off, he drags the shirt over her head—cautious of her injured shoulder—all while she keeps telling him how pretty he is.

“You think I’m pretty,” he says, as he coaxes her into lying on her left side, off of her injury. Grabbing a throw pillow, Tommy carefully slides it under her head. She snuggles into it and nods a little.

“Unfairly pretty,” she says.

Tommy grabs the blanket resting across the back of the couch and drapes it over Felicity, tucking it around her shoulders. “Goodnight,” he whispers.

“Goodnight room,” she tells him, eyes closed, halfway asleep already. “Goodnight moon. Goodnight cow jumping over...”

He bends down and kisses her temple, smoothing back her curls. Running a hand through his hair, Tommy checks the Glock at his belt. He does a quick perimeter sweep of Felicity’s house, front door, back door, all the windows. When he’s finished, he settles into her recliner and braces himself for a long night.

Oliver shows up five hours later, looking dead on his feet. Tommy lets him inside and the two of them re-check the perimeter. When they return to the living room, Oliver kneels beside the couch and brushes back Felicity’s hair. “She okay?”

“She’s mostly been asleep,” Tommy tells him, scrubbing his hands across his face as he sits back down, bracing his hands on his knees. “Everything else has been quiet.”

Tenderly, Oliver kisses Felicity’s temple. Tommy looks away. “Thank you for staying with her,” Oliver says. “I probably shouldn’t have asked—”

“I was glad to do it,” Tommy says. “Besides, you can’t be everywhere at once. You gotta let people help you, Oliver.”

Standing up, Oliver moves to the armchair opposite Tommy’s, leaning back and kicking his legs up on the ottoman. He presses his fingers to the bridge of his nose.

“There’s too many of us for you to protect _all_ of us,” Tommy tells him. “You have to let us all protect each other.”

Oliver gives him a weary look. “I don’t like the idea of putting you all in danger.”

“You’re not the one putting us in danger,” Tommy points out. They’re approaching the edge of a disagreement they’ve been having lately. “We all live in this city. We all know what that means. Together we can keep each other safe.”

“I still don’t want you in the field,” Oliver snaps. “I need… I need you untouched by this.”

Tommy hooks his fingers in his shirt collar and pulls it to the side, exposing the skin of his shoulder, and the white, puckered scar from the piece of rebar that nearly killed him. “I’m very far from untouched by this, Oliver.”

Oliver closes his eyes, tips his head back and sighs. “I _know._ ”

Tommy studies him, the exhaustion around his eyes and the tension in his shoulders. He glances back at Felicity, at the way she’s taking slow, easy breaths. “She’s gonna be out for a while. Why don’t you sleep, Oliver?  I’ll wake you if anything happens.”

Tiredly, Oliver nods. “Okay,” he says, and Tommy doesn’t know how to comprehend that level of trust—not when it’s shown towards _him_. “Thank you.”

Tommy nods to acknowledge the gratitude. Oliver shoves a throw pillow behind his head, and Tommy notices that he angles himself in the chair so that he’s in the best position to see Felicity. It takes only a few minutes for Oliver’s eyes to drift shut. In another ten minutes, the rhythm of his breathing has changed, and Tommy feels himself relax, knowing that they’re both asleep. That they’re both safe.

Picking up one of the technology magazines Felicity keeps stacked between her armchairs, Tommy flips through the pages and watches over his friends as they sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next update should hopefully be on March 31st.


	5. PART ONE: CHAPTER FIVE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Slade Wilson's men descend on Starling.

 

Felicity finds Oliver on the floor of the secondary lair she lets him think she doesn’t know about. He’s sitting with his back against a concrete pillar. She doesn’t touch him, doesn’t say anything, just sits down on the floor near him. They’re looking in different directions. Felicity sets her hand down next to his leg and waits. It takes a few minutes, but eventually the touch of his hand over hers is steady and sure.

Helplessness beats heavy in Felicity’s chest.

“I’m sorry, Oliver.” She closes her eyes and lets her head fall back against the concrete behind her. “I’m so sorry.”

“I couldn’t—” his voice is gravelly. Like he’s been screaming. “I couldn’t _stop_ him. And she just… She’s gone, and it’s my fault.”

“It’s not your fault, Oliver,” Felicity says. She wants to reach out for him, wrap her arms around him, but she’s not sure how he would respond to that. “You did everything you could.”

“It wasn’t _enough_ ,” he chokes out. “It’s never enough. Not to save any of them. I knelt in front of him and I _begged_ him to take my life instead, but he wouldn’t. And so my _mother_ saved Thea.”

The quietness of the room amplifies Felicity’s gasp. If she could, if she had the means and opportunity, she would put a bullet in Slade Wilson without thinking twice.

“I have to face him,” Oliver says. “It’s the only way to make this stop. Even if it means that I—”

“You have to _stop him_ ,” she agrees. “Whatever it takes. Even if what it takes is killing him. There are no _ifs_ or _ands_ or _buts_ Oliver. All he is going to do is keep on killing innocent people.”

Oliver is silent.

“Oliver.” Felicity moves forward on her hands and knees until she’s right in front of him. She tucks her legs beneath her body and sets her hands on his knees. “He killed your _mother_. What is stopping you?”

“I don’t want…” He can’t look at her, but that doesn’t matter. “I don’t want you to look at me and see a killer. I don’t want my _sister_ to look at me and see that. Not when I said that I was doing this another way.”

She cups his cheek with her hand, unbothered by the way he flinches first, then closes his eyes and leans into her touch. The way Oliver responds to tenderness never fails to break her heart. “I watched you kill the Count. You _protected_ me, Oliver. Killing him— _stopping_ him—protected me. If you have to stop Slade by killing him, then you’ll be doing what you need to do to protect me, Thea, and all of Starling City. ”

Quickly, his eyes open. She can see his doubt and fear and grief clear as day.

“Trust me, Oliver,” she whispers. “If you killed Slade Wilson under these circumstances, the only thing I could ever say to you in the face of that is _thank you_. And still, I promise you: If there is another way, I will help you find it.”

He leans forward, wrapping an arm around her body and pressing his lips to her forehead. “If we make it out of this alive,” he says, his voice rough. “I’m marrying you.”

She pulls back, blinking several times in surprise. A blush sweeps over her cheeks. “Aren’t you supposed to ask me first?”

“Felicity,” Oliver says, pulling back to look in her eyes. “I have no ring. The city is falling into chaos. Neither of us might make it through this alive. But if we do, I want you to marry me.”

“Are you sure that’s not the grief talking?”

He takes her left hand and kisses her fourth finger, right over her knuckle. “It’s not. As soon as this is over, I will get you a ring. I promise.”

“We have to finish this first,” she says.

“We will,” he says. “Is that a yes?.”

“Okay,” she breathes. “That’s a yes.” Leaning forward for his kiss is almost instinct by this point. Oliver’s hand cups the back of her neck, drawing her closer. Considering how he shies away from any tenderness expressed toward him, the way he kisses her is amazingly gentle.

“You realize,” she says. “That in order to marry me, you have to stay _alive_.”

His gaze is level. Determined. Easy. Hopeful. He’s not as lost as he was a few moments ago. “I will stay alive, I promise.”

The sound of the door opening and closing ends the moment.

“Hey,” Tommy says, shuffling towards them, his hands stuffed into his pockets. “Funeral’s starting soon.”

Felicity sits back and watches as Oliver struggles to his feet. He’s not hurt, just grieving and exhausted.

“I can’t,” Oliver says.

“You _can_ ,” Tommy tells him. “In fact, you _have_ to. For yourself. For your mother. For Thea.”

Oliver shakes his head, and he looks defeated. “No.”

“I will be with you the whole time.” Tommy reaches for him, steadying him. “So will Felicity. You’re not going to go through this alone.”

Sensing that his words are a cue, Felicity comes around to Oliver’s other side, helping him wrap an arm around her for support. “You can do this, Oliver.”

Together, the three of them walk outside into the sunlight.

* * *

After Moira’s funeral, as the reception is winding down, Thea comes up to Tommy. She doesn’t say anything, just leans the side of her body into his and lets him wrap an arm around her shoulders. He touches his hand to the side of her face, holds her gently as he ducks his head down to kiss her hair.

“You holding up?” he asks.

“I can’t stay here,” she says quietly, but there’s a frantic edge to her words. “I have to go. I have to _leave_.”

“Hey,” he leans back, makes it a point to look her in the eyes. “This isn’t what you want to hear, but now isn’t the time to make rash decisions.”

“Everything about this city _hurts_ , Tommy. I keep thinking I’m going to see _him_ on every streetcorner. The only reason I’m even still here is because my mom is not. She—”

In his arms, Thea starts shaking. Tommy holds her tighter, glancing over her to where Oliver and Felicity are standing on the other side of the room with one of the last of the lingering guests. Felicity has one hand wrapped around Oliver’s, and the other she’s using to dab at her eyes with a handkerchief. The sight does something funny to Tommy’s heart.

Felicity barely knew Moria, and Tommy was not under the impression that the women were anything other than cordial. It’s nice to know she cares enough to cry for Oliver.

“I just can’t stay,” Thea says again, and Tommy thinks of Slade Wilson threatening her, threatening Moira, thinks of Slade with a sword going for Thea’s heart, thinks about how he threatened _all that Oliver loved_.

This man wants to break his best friend, make Oliver _wish_ for death. And given what Oliver’s survived, Tommy’s not sure how far Slade Wilson will have to go to accomplish that horrible mission, but Tommy can’t escape the feeling that it’s too far.

Tommy’s not going to let him do it. Step one is getting Thea out of Slade’s crosshairs.

“Okay,” he tells her. “Okay, let’s get you out of Starling for a few weeks.”

He pulls back, hands on her shoulders, keeping her in his eyeline. “Just until things settle down, though. I don’t—”

Sudden emotion threatens to strangle him. “I don’t want you gone forever.”

Thea wraps her arms around him again, presses her cheek to his chest. “I won’t be gone forever.”

“You’d better not be,” Tommy says.

Oliver and Felicity say goodbye to the gentleman and his wife, and suddenly it strikes Tommy that everyone is essentially gone. He looks around. Thea’s next to him, but Laurel, Dig, Oliver and Felicity walk towards the two of them until all six of them are standing in a circle, sharing what Tommy suspects will be their last few moments in this house. Oliver’s not living here. Thea won’t want to. And the  woman who raised her children here will never stand inside these walls again.

“There’s something I need to tell you,” Oliver says softly, surveying the group gathered around him. “Something I should have trusted you with earlier.”

He’s clutching Felicity’s hand with both of his, and looking right at Thea. “I’m sorry about that. Before I even say it, I’m sorry.” Tommy watches Oliver’s gaze slip over to Laurel, but her expression doesn’t change. She isn’t resigned or concerned. She looks… accepting. Like there’s nothing Oliver could tell her that would change anything—even though Tommy very deeply doubts that’s true.

“I’m the Arrow,” Oliver says, and the room goes completely still. Tommy’s arm is still loosely around Thea, and he feels the way she tenses.

Laurel moves to Oliver’s side, opposite of Felicity. She lays a hand on his shoulder. “I know.”

Oliver’s face twists in confusion. “How?”

“Slade told me,” she says. “I think he was doing it to hurt you.”

They share a look, but no verbal communication passes between them.

“Thea?” Oliver says carefully, turning to their sister.

“Is that why?” She asks quietly, voice full of anguish. “Did mom die because you’re the Arrow?”

She may as well have stabbed Oliver through the heart, Tommy thinks, but she’s likely ignorant of that fact.

“No,” Oliver says in what barely qualifies as a whisper. “No. This was before. This was because of what happened on the island.”

“What happened?” Thea asks, pushing out of Tommy’s arms and taking two determined steps in Oliver’s direction. “What _happened_ on that island?”

“A man,” Oliver begins slowly. “Wanted information. He put Sara and another woman—Shado—on their knees and he—”

Felicity turns so she’s facing away from the group, one hand still in Oliver’s, the other on his shoulder. She rests her forehead against him. Tommy’s struck with the realization that she’s _heard_ this story.

“He told me to choose,” Oliver says brokenly. “He told me to pick which one I wanted to die, and the only person I wanted to die was _me_.”

“I’m sorry,” Laruel says quietly. “I’m sorry he asked that of you, Oliver.”

Oliver clears his throat, blinks a few times. “He shot Shado,” he says. “He took away what Slade—the man who killed…”

His voice breaks. “The man who killed Mom. He took away what Slade loved. Now Slade wants to take away everyone I love… which is essentially everyone in this room.”

He looks around the circle. Oliver’s eyes find Tommy first, then Dig, Laurel, Thea. “He’s not getting to any of you without a fight.”

“We have to be smart about this,” Felicity says. “We have to take him down. We have to protect each other. He can’t get to us if we all have each other’s backs.”

“I’m leaving Starling City,” Thea says suddenly, bluntly. “I’m getting out of here.”

Oliver meets Tommy’s eyes. “As much as I hate to say it, Speedy, that’s a good idea.”

“I’ll make sure she’s safe,” Tommy says. “I _will_ , Oliver.”

He nods. “I know you will.”

“And the rest of us?” Laurel asks.

“We need a battle plan,” Felicity says, crossing her arms. “And we’re going to get one.”

They split apart after that. Oliver, Felicity, Laurel and Dig leave for the Arrowcave while Tommy helps Thea pack up her things. Felicity keeps him updated with brief texts.

**Felicity Smoak:** Blood working with Slade Wilson. Laurel has proof.

**Felicity Smoak:** Oliver going to confront Blood.

**Felicity Smoak:** Blood’s bodyguard gave up intel on Wilson’s operation.

Tommy gets the last text as he stands with Thea in the darkness of the Queen’s foyer, listening as she tearfully says goodbye to Walter over the phone.

He types back a quick message.

**Tommy Merlyn:** Be careful.

There’s no reply from Felicity.

Thea slides her phone into her jacket pocket; Tommy puts a hand on her shoulder. “You ready to go?”

“I’m never coming back here,” she says. “It feels odd that I’m relieved about that.”

“A lot happened here,” Tommy says. “A lot of good and a lot of bad. It makes sense.”

She nods, slowly. “All right. Let’s go.”

As soon as Tommy leaves Thea at the train station, everything spins wildly out of control. Slade’s army descends on the city. There’s no way for him to get back to Oliver, or Felicity, or Laurel, or anybody. He’s nowhere near the lair, but he _is_ a block away from the storage compartment where he threw all of Malcolm’s things after the Undertaking.

Tommy hasn’t spent five years in purgatory, like Oliver or Sara, but he _has_ pushed his body until every muscle aches. He has taken a deadly weapon in his hands, aimed it at another human being, and…

He hadn’t pulled the trigger when he’d looked at his father. He couldn’t do it. Even realizing what Malcolm was, how much Malcolm hated—the Glade’s, Tommy, even Tommy’s mother—Tommy couldn’t pull that trigger.

But these men are not his father. These men will kill him. Almost more importantly: These men will kill _Thea_.

Or Felicity, or Oliver, or Sara, or Laurel… and Tommy can’t let that happen. He won’t.

He is not Oliver. He is not a _warrior_.

Yet this Tommy knows: He may not be like Oliver in the sense that they are not both warriors, but Tommy lived through rebar through the chest and a deadly earthquake. He kept moving despite his father’s hatred and his mother’s death. He kept _breathing_ even after losing Oliver. He _survived._ And in that way he and Oliver are exactly the same.

Moving quickly, Tommy rummages through his father’s weapons until he’s found a crossbow. He’s used one before. Never in actual combat, but he feels confident that he’ll be able to hit what he’s aiming at.

In the box beneath it is the Dark Archer suit his father wore. It’s lined with kevlar.

He hesitates, not sure he can put it on. But Starling City is _burning_. There are monsters out there. Monsters with strength that rivals _Oliver’s_ , much less his own.

Is he willing to literally take on his father’s legacy just to _live_? Tommy’s not sure.

And then Thea sends him a text that just says: **911**.

There’s no more time to think. He takes what he needs and pulls on his father’s mask and goes to get his sister. Malcolm’s legacy isn’t worth touching just for his own life, but it’s no longer just his life. It’s _Thea’s_.

The train station is a madhouse when he arrives. Men in masks are tearing the place apart. Tommy helps a woman and her young daughter get away from two of them and is forced into combat with a few more before he finds Thea.

He’s not a fighter. His moves are inelegant and less-than-effective. It’s dirty fighting, teeth and nails and creative weaponry.

Then he catches a glimpse of Thea’s dark red jacket, and he shoves an arrow into the stomach of one of Wilson’s goons. As he makes his way towards Thea at a run, he sees her dash for the double doors that lead outside, watches as she tugs on the handles only to find that she’s been locked inside. One of Slade’s men grabs her shoulders, drags her back, and even though he’s still uncomfortably far away, Tommy raises his father’s crossbow and fires.

The man—the monster?—yanks the arrow out of his side and stares first at it, then at _him_.

“Who are you?” He asks, right as Tommy flicks a button on his bow that causes the arrow to explode in the man’s face.

Thea’s backing away, alarmed, afraid. He rips his mask off and runs for Thea with a low, threatening, “I’m her brother.”

* * *

 

Starling City burns. Oliver stares out of the widows of his former office at QC and watches the smoke and flames. Even with Nyssa and the League members, even with Sara and Diggle and Lyla and recently cured Roy, Oliver isn’t sure they’ll actually be able to turn the tide.

He’s not sure he can keep the people he cares about safe. He’s not sure he can keep _Felicity_ safe.

“Tommy called,” Felicity tells Oliver, putting a hand on his shoulder that does little to settle the storm raging inside him. “There was a disturbance at the train station. He got Thea out. I told him to meet up with us here. They’re a few minutes out. Laurel and Quentin are on their way. He says the police station isn’t safe anymore.”

Oliver nods. He can’t bear to look at her. “I should have made you go too. You’re a target, and right now this entire city is in Slade’s crosshairs.”

“Do you remember what I told you?” Felicity asks, dropping her hand from his shoulder and threading her fingers through his. “The last time this city was under siege and you wanted me to leave?”

He’s quiet; he remembers.

“If you’re not leaving, I’m not leaving,” she repeats. “It’s still true. I’m not going anywhere without you. We will get through this, Oliver. All of us. _Alive._ ”

He reaches for her, and this hug is reminiscent of their embrace at the clock tower, where he clung to her out of desperation for reassurance and hope, but also gratefulness for _her_ and for her presence in his life. She tucks her head under his chin and says, “We just have to find another way.”

“I can’t outthink him,” Oliver tells her, because he _can’t_. It’s not in his wheelhouse. Slade knows him too well. This is not an enemy he can deceive because he’s just “Oliver Queen” and nobody expects much from him.

Slade Wilson helped _train_ him.

In his arms, Felicity pulls back, looks him right in the eye, and says, “You don’t have to. Let him outthink you.” Off of what must be the puzzled expression on his face, she continues, “His brain’s got nothing on _mine_.”

A few minutes later, Tommy arrives decked out from head to toe in Malcolm’s Dark Archer garb, and the only reason Oliver suspects no one—mainly Sara and Nyssa—doesn’t shoot him on sight is the fact that his gloved hand is wrapped around Thea’s.

But that’s not how Oliver recognizes him. Oliver fought Malcolm in the suit, knows how the clothes fit the man. And the way the man with Thea walks, the way he carries himself, Oliver _knows_ that walk, knows that body.

They’ve just barely stepped inside the room when Thea drops Tommy’s hand and goes running for Roy.

As she plows into him, Harper lifts her right off of her feet. His eyes are closed and Oliver can see the pain in his face, but that doesn’t make him let go of Thea. “Sin told me,” Thea says when Roy sets her down. “About the drug. Tommy filled me in on the rest. Are you okay?”

Roy pointed looks at Oliver. “Yeah. I’m okay.”

“What the hell are you wearing?” Sara asks Tommy, eyeing him up-and-down.

“Armor,” Tommy says, without missing a beat. When he takes the mask off, Oliver sees tiredness in his eyes. He wonders just what Tommy has done tonight to keep their sister safe. To get her here.

Oliver knows what he would do.

“Armor that does not belong to you,” Nyssa says sourly.

“If anyone is dishonoring the _good name_ of the League,” Tommy tells her, taking a menacing step in her direction, “I’m fairly certain it was the man who plotted to destroy half this city while wearing this armor.”

They stare at each other for a moment, but then Nyssa is the one who lets the tension drop from the air. “That is not a man whose mantle I would voluntarily choose to lay across my shoulders.”

“And I wouldn’t want to be the Heir to the Demon, but none of us choose our fathers,” Tommy says.

“We shall leave this indiscretion here, then.” Nyssa turns from Tommy to the larger group assembling. “We have battle plans to draw.”

When Quentin and Laurel arrive, Felicity fills the four newcomers in. “We know Slade’s men will be in Giordano Tunnel. Oliver and Diggle got the Mirakuru cure back from Sebastian Blood.”

“Where is Diggle?” Tommy asks.

“He and Lyla went to ARGUS,” Oliver answers. “To try and stop her from leveling Starling.”

Tommy lets out a low whistle. No one else quite knows what to say to that.

It’s Nyssa who gets back to business. “Fortunately, with Slade's men attempting to leave via the tunnel, all of our targets will be in a single place.”

Sara says, “That means we can take them all out at once—non-lethal. Hit ‘em with the cure and knock them down.”

“We’ll lose Slade,” Felicity says. “He’ll slip away or he won’t be there at all, but either way, we’ll lose the opportunity to get him if we don’t add a second part to the plan.”

“What are you suggesting?” Quentin asks gruffly.

“He wants to kill the woman Oliver loves,” Felicity says simply, and the words are a shock to Oliver’s system, like a bucket of ice water crashing over his head and slithering down his spine. “That means he’s coming for _me_. Or possibly Thea, but he’s already had the opportunity to kill her once and he let her go.”

And just like that, Oliver knows exactly what she’s suggesting.

“I don’t like it,” Oliver says. “I don’t like putting you in that position.”

“You’re not putting me in any position. I’m volunteering.”

“What’s to stop him from just killing you on the spot?” Tommy asks.

“He won’t,” Felicity says firmly. “He’ll wait. He wants to make sure Oliver watches.”

A flash of his mother’s death invades Oliver’s brain so quickly it robs him of his ability to breathe. He can feel the damp ground beneath his knees, the tightness of the zip tie around his wrists, the wet sting of tears in his eyes.

A cool sweat breaks out on the back of his neck, across his shoulders. He can feel hands on his face, gentle fingers caressing his skin; he can hear Felicity’s voice saying his name, but it’s far away. All he can see is Felicity, just as she was a few moments ago, hair falling out of her ponytail, traces of blood on her face, bruises forming on her forehead.

He can see the way her body jolts when Slade runs the sword through her heart. He can see the shock and pain in her eyes as she falls to the ground.

He can’t watch that. He can’t _ever_ watch that.

It’ll kill him.

He comes back to the present slowly. Felicity’s standing in front of him, her hands against his neck. Either no one is reacting to his momentary surge of fear and grief, or no one knows how to.

“I can do this, Oliver,” Felicity tells him. “I can.”

“I know you can,” he says quietly. “I just don’t want you to.”

“I’m not a huge fan of the idea either,” she says, “But it’s our best play.”

And because she’s right, because she’s brilliant and beautiful and brave, and he wants to marry her for _all_ of those things, Oliver says, “You’re right.”

“Now,” Sara says, looking at Tommy, Laurel and Thea. “What about you three?”

“I can fire a bow,” Thea says.

Tommy and Oliver look at each other, panicked and horrified. “It’s my city too,” Thea says. “That means I get to protect it if I want.”

“I don’t want _any_ of you in the tunnel,” Oliver tells them. “All of Slade’s men are there, so the rest of the city should be relatively safe if you’re smart.”

“You don’t get to make that call,” Tommy takes a step in Oliver’s direction.

“If I _don’t_ make that call, you’re out in the middle of a battle with super-soldiers, and so is _Thea_. Slade has Felicity right where he wants her and everything...” He swallows thickly. “Everything could go sideways on a dime, and I can’t—”

It takes him a moment, but the room gives it to him. “I can’t protect all of you.”

“You don’t have to, Oliver.” It’s Thea, right next to Felicity, her hand on his shoulder. “You just have to trust us to protect each other.”

He’s not sure if he can do that.

“If I could make a suggestion,” Quentin says. “Someone needs to stand patrol on the Starling entrance to the tunnel. Make sure none of Slade’s men escape back into the city.”

“It’ll still be dangerous,” Sara adds, “but we do need bodies there.”

And because it’s Sara saying it, because it’s Sara’s sister and Tommy’s sister that they’re talking about and they’re both nervous but willing to go along with it, Oliver agrees.

Roy looks at Thea. “Let’s get you a bow.”

“Come with me,” Sara tells Laurel, reaching for her hand. “I have a spare mask.”

 

* * *

 

Oliver Queen tells Felicity Smoak he loves her, and the next words out of her mouth are: “Then don’t leave me here.”

But then he’s pushing the Mirakuru cure into her hand, and she’s wrapping her fingers tightly around the syringe. To mask the movement, he bends to kiss her. It’s simple, but it’s not quick. His lips linger against hers. She drops the cure into her pocket and reaches forward to hold onto his arm, her fingers digging into the leather of the suit.

She’s scared. She’s also brave. And those two things can exist inside her at the same time.

She’s expecting, once the kiss is done, for Oliver to give her one last look and back away. Instead he grabs her left hand. She’s not sure where he was keeping the ring he slides onto the appropriate finger.

“Oliver,” she whispers, staring at the glittering diamond.

“I meant what I said,” he tells her. “Every word.”

She nods, stunned. And because it just might be the last chance she gets to say it, she tells him, “I love you.”

The look he gives her in response turns her legs into jelly. She longs for better circumstances. Different circumstances. _Time_.

They’ll have time, she promises herself. As soon as this night is over. They’ll have all the time they want. They just have to get through tonight.

Oliver leaves, and it doesn’t take Slade long to find her. She never doubted that it would.

She levels her Glock at Slade’s chest and empties the magazine. Her aim is good, but her assailant doesn’t go down. Instead he twists the gun from her grip—and oh, _god_ , her wrist, her wrist is on _fire_ , pain spiking up her arm and she screams as he throws her to the ground. She’s terrified that he’ll find the cure on her, but Slade misjudges her the same way he misunderstands Oliver.

From then on, all it takes is waiting for the right moment. When it arrives, it reminds Felicity of her encounter with the Count in all the worst ways. It’s a sword at her neck instead of a needle; it’s Oliver hesitating to put his bow down, yet ultimately relenting.

The main difference is that she holds the power now. Her thumb flicks open the cap of the cure, she grips the tube in her hands, visualizing how to throw her arm back, where to stab Slade when she strikes. Her palms sweat, her heart races, and her wrist still hurts like _hell_ , but _everything—_ her survival, Oliver’s survival—depends on her being able to do this right.

She cannot fail Oliver.

And she doesn’t.

In the aftermath, she sits on a table in the still-ransacked lair while Diggle presses an ice pack to her wrist. If he notices the ring on her finger, he doesn’t mention it. Felicity glances around the room. Most of the debris has been swept up, furniture righted. She’s still mourning the loss of her computer system, the broken monitors and equipment scattered across the floor.

Oliver and Laurel are quietly talking in one corner; Tommy and Sara are sitting on the training mats. Roy and Thea are over by the row of suits. She can hear snippts of conversation: Laurel telling Oliver that it felt good to _do_ something, Sara telling Tommy he did well out there, Roy telling Thea that red is a good color on her.

For the first time Felicity can remember, she feels surrounded by family. It’s a little overwhelming, in a unbelievably lovely sort of way.

She’s the last one being patched up, and her injury prevented her from being able to effectively help anyone else.

“Pretty sure it’s just a sprain,” Diggle tells her once he’s finished. 

“Could have been worse,” Felicity says.

“You don’t have to tell me. Glad it wasn’t though.” He pats her shoulder and smiles down at her warmly. “You did good today.”

She gives him a smile. “Thanks.”

Oliver walks over to them. The way he carries himself telegraphs his uncertainty and nervousness. They haven’t had much of a chance to process anything over the past few days. Right now all Felicity wants to do is sleep.

Preferably with Oliver next to her. A good eight hours, at least. Maybe a few extra. They did just save the city.

Dig steps away as Oliver approaches, and he gives Felicity a look that makes her certain he did in fact catch the very telling ring on her finger.

“Where’d you find the ring?” Felicity asks Oliver quietly. “I’m pretty sure you didn’t have time to go shopping.”

“It was my mother’s,” he tells her, his voice wavering a bit on the last word. “I’ll get you a different one, if you want. I just—” He licks his lips, shifts on his feet. “If anything were to happen to you, I wanted it with you.”

Carefully, Felicity slides off of the table and onto her feet. Oliver grabs her elbows to help steady her. “Well,” she says, “I can say that while Slade had me, there was something really nice about looking down and seeing it.”

It was proof they were real. Solid, physical, heavy on her finger.

Oliver Queen loves her. Oliver Queen wants her to be his _wife_.

The thought is thrilling.

“Come home with me,” Felicity says, very, very quietly. Roy has impressive hearing. She’d rather him not hear this. With her good hand, she laces her fingers through Oliver’s. She knows him. Even though they’re practically living together, he’ll sleep down here despite the broken lights and mess on the floor. She doesn’t want that tonight.

They climb onto his motorcycle, and she slides her hands into the pockets of his brown leather jacket, pressing her body up against his. The ride home is a blur. Her body is too tired and her brain is too busy to process most of it.

Felicity remembers removing her glasses, kicking off her shoes and unsnapping her bra. After that, Oliver guides her into the bathroom and undresses her himself, his hands quickly removing her shirt and helping her pull off her jeans. He’s incredibly careful as he looses her hair from its ponytail, sliding his fingers through the tresses and massaging her scalp. She closes her eyes and holds back the tiniest of moans.

Leaning into the shower, Oliver starts the water running with a turn of his wrist. He yanks off his shirt and shucks off his pants, kicking both pieces of clothing over into the pile quickly accumulating in the corner.

The water is hot and perfect against all her aches and pains. She’s so utterly exhausted, but Oliver’s right there to hold her up. She rests her forehead against his chest and lets him lather shampoo through her hair.

Together, they scrub away the dirt and the grime. They’re both dead on their feet, but they stand under the soothing spray until the water turns cold. When Oliver finally shuts it off, he wraps Felicity up in a towel, helps her dry off with slow, easy movements.

He doesn’t laugh when she ties an old t-shirt around her head to keep her curls at bay throughout the night. Once that’s done, she falls onto her bed completely naked. Oliver collapses beside her. He’s stripped down to his boxers, and he’s all solid and warm as he presses up behind her, his breath against her neck and his arms wrapped around her.

It doesn’t take long for her to drift off to sleep.

When she does, she dreams that the cure didn’t work. She dreams that Slade slit her throat. She dreams of putting her hands to her neck, feeling blood gush through her fingers while he makes her watch as he drives his sword through Oliver’s chest.

She wakes up mid-scream.

Oliver’s lightly shaking her shoulders, saying her name in a pleading, worried tone. Everything feels horribly wrong for a moment, like she’s not in her own skin. But then reality settles in. She’s in her room. She’s safe. Oliver’s here.

Closing her eyes, she rolls over in Oliver’s arms, reaching out for him, whispering his name. She hears him murmuring in her ear, gentle words of reassurance.

Oliver’s right here. He’s with her. He’s not gone. There is no sword plunged through his chest.

She holds him tightly, not wanting to let him go.

It was just a dream, she tells herself, as she feels Oliver kiss her temple. Just a dream. Just a nightmare.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There likely won't be an update next week (April 7th), because I'll be out of town. The next update should be April 14th. Thanks in advance for your patience.


	6. PART ONE: CHAPTER SIX

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver and Felicity get married.

Thunderstorms split the sky the day of Oliver Queen’s wedding. He wakes up sprawled across the spare full-size bed in Tommy’s hotel room. He rolls off of the mattress, tugs on one leg of his jeans and then the other. When he draws back the curtains, the sky is dark grey, lit up every once in awhile by flashes of lightning. Raindrops pelt against the windows.

Oliver glances behind him at the opposite bed. Tommy did a faceplant there sometime late last night, and it doesn’t look like he’s moved since. The rest of the room is perfectly ordinary, nothing amiss or different from the night before.

The sudden rapid-fire knocks on the hotel room door make Oliver finch. His heartbeat jumps into a quicker tempo; his eyes quickly scan the room for any kind of weapon as he creeps towards the door.

“Tommy,” a female voice yells from behind the door. “It’s _noon_. The wedding is at _four_.”

Thea.

Oliver moves aside the ironing board—previously propped against the door so that if anyone made it inside they couldn’t do so without creating a ton of noise in the process—unlatches the deadbolt and twists open the door handle. “Hey, Speedy.”

“Oh good,” she says. “You’re awake.”

“Tommy’s not,” Oliver says, as another crack of thunder makes him close his eyes and suck in a deep breath. He tightens his fingers around the metal of the door handle, feels how smooth and solid it is. He’s _here_. Not on the island. Not drowning in a Yacht. _Here_.

“We can fix that.” Thea pushes past Oliver into the room. She _jumps_ on the bed, landing on her knees and Oliver has flashbacks to when she was little and would run into his bedroom and do the same thing on Christmas mornings. Always his, never their parents. They’d sneak downstairs and he’d make hot chocolate and they’d guess at the presents under the tree.

Thea shakes Tommy’s shoulder, and he moans. “I’m _up_.”

“Oliver’s getting married,” she whispers loudly in his ear. “Oliver’s getting _married_.”

Tommy gently swats at her. “I think I can take it from here,” Oliver tells Thea.

She points a finger at him, then at Tommy. “Showers. Both of you. Then tuxes. Picture are at three on the _dot_. Don’t be late.”

Oliver and Tommy don’t talk much as they get ready. Maybe they got it all out the night before, over drinks and laughter and barbeque wings.

Once the tuxes are on and they have a few minutes to kill before pictures, Oliver takes a black velvet box from inside his suitcase and sets it carefully in Tommy’s outstretched palm. “Don’t—” Oliver starts.

“I’m not gonna lose it,” Tommy promises, lifting the lid to peek inside at Felicity’s wedding band. “This is beautiful.”

Oliver smiles. The happiness inside him feels strange, but he’s not going to dedicate any time today to questioning or second guessing it. “I never thought we’d be here.”

“Neither did I,” Tommy says, “But for different reasons.”

The Gambit. _Lian Yu_. Oliver thinks their reasons are _almost_ the same. They both thought he wasn’t coming home.

“I never told you about Hong Kong,” Oliver says, suddenly fighting to keep emotion out of his voice. He’s not sure why this part of his past feels _open_ to him now. Maybe it’s this realization of how heartbroken Tommy was when he thought they wouldn’t have this moment. Maybe it’s this realization of how glad he is right now that he gets this moment with Tommy. Maybe it’s just the realization that the inner circle of his heart holds only a few people, and Tommy is one of them.

And there are things, important things, that Tommy doesn’t know.

Tommy’s face goes pale. “Hong Kong?”

Oliver nods. “Hong Kong. I wasn’t on the island for five years. Not for all of them. You got— You were so close, and they would have killed you.” He looks Tommy right in the eyes. “I couldn’t let that happen.”

“You—” Tommy’s voice breaks. “You knew I stopped looking.”

Oliver’s heart spirals frantically downward in his chest. “No. I knew you _kept_ looking. I made you think I was dead. _I did_.” He plants his fist against his breastbone. “That was _me_. And I know you didn’t deserve that, but I did it to keep you alive.”

Shocked, Tommy shakes his head, his gaze falling to the floor. “Why are you telling me this now?”

“I don’t want secrets today,” Oliver tells him. “Not between you and me. The truth is, I think knowing that you looked for me for so long is part of what kept me alive. And I’ve never thanked you for that.”

Neither of them acknowledge the tears in their eyes.

“You don’t owe me thanks,” Tommy tells him.

“I think I do,” Oliver says. “For more than just that.”

In one quick movement, Tommy grabs him close in a hug. Oliver closes his eyes, holds on tightly. “I’m glad you came back.” Tommy clears his throat roughly.

As they back away, Tommy says, “Thea’s gonna be up here any second to drag us downstairs to do photographs. We should get going.”

It strikes Oliver as sort of funny that thanks to wedding photographers, brides are willing to ignore the tradition of the groom not seeing them in the dress until the actual wedding. But whether walking down an aisle or just standing next to her mother and future sister-in-law having a calm conversation, Felicity Smoak in a wedding gown steals all of Oliver’s breath away.

As if she senses him there, Felicity turns away from the group the second he steps into the room. Her veil is long and fluttery around her shoulders, and she adjusts it a little as she walks toward him, careful of every step.

Oliver meets her halfway, and for a few moments, all they do is stare at each other. Felicity takes his hand, her fingers loosely wrapped around his. “Hi,” she says softly.

“Hey,” he tells her.

Thunder booms overhead; a camera shutter clicks.

And for as long as he lives, that’s Oliver’s favorite picture of their wedding day.

An hour later, Donna Smoak takes her daughter's arm and ushers her down the aisle. She pats Oliver Queen’s hand and presses a kiss to his cheek, and Oliver fights a sudden surge of emotion.

Oliver and Felicity stand across from each other in front of the officiant. Felicity’s hair is down and curly, swept over her left shoulder with dozens of pearl hair pins. Her wedding dress is full-length and figure-hugging. It glitters and shines, but nothing shines brighter than Felicity's smile.

Thea stands beside Felicity, and Tommy stands by Oliver. Donna, Roy, Diggle and a now-showing Lyla are in the front row. Sara Lance—whose recent return from the League of Assassins for the occasion was a total surprise—is right next to Laurel Lance. The rows behind them fill with acquaintances and coworkers that blur together.

Neither of Oliver’s parents are there, and he can feel their absence keenly. It doesn’t ruin the day. It’s just another part of it. He suspects that Felicity feels similarly about her father.

The diamond ring feels heavy in Oliver’s hands as Tommy hands it to him. Felicity’s left hand is shaking just a little as she holds it out for him. Oliver steadies it in one of his own, lifting her fourth finger and sliding the wedding band over her knuckles.

Then it’s Felicity’s turn. She holds his gold ring in her fingers and slides it on carefully. Oliver can’t take his eyes off of their hands, off of the ring on hers and the ring now on his and the sight of how _perfect_ they look like that.

The exchanging of the rings is one of the last events in the ceremony. Oliver almost misses the officiant announcing them as Mr and Mrs Queen.

He doesn’t miss the all-important “You may kiss the bride,” because he’s been waiting to kiss her —really kiss her, not just the quick pecks on the lips they’d allowed themselves for the photographs—since he saw her in her dress.

Oliver puts his hands on her waist; Felicity presses her fingertips to his cheeks. He kisses her eagerly, every part of him filled with unspeakable joy. The cheers from the crowd echo in his ears.

Their first dance is hardly an elaborate thing. Oliver’s good at the standing and swaying part. He’s good at wrapping his arms around her and holding her close. He’s good at the occasional kiss and their own soft, private conversation. It’s a wonderful little bubble.

There is no mention of a father and daughter dance or a mother and son dance, and that is by design. Instead, Donna comes over and takes his hand, laughing loudly and smiling widely as she drags him onto the dance floor.

“You made my baby girl happy,” she tells him, with tears in her eyes. “And I am so grateful for that.”

He opens his mouth to say something, but Donna continues, “I’m sorry your mom couldn’t be here. Your dad too.”

The pain from that loss that he’s been fighting with all day goes from a dull throb in his chest to a sharp ache. Even as Oliver finds himself disconnecting, looking past Donna at the room around him, something about her acknowledgement of what he’s been feeling starts to slowly ease the pain he’s carrying.

“Thank you,” he manages, his voice thick. “Thank you.”

She pats his shoulder gently. “You’re welcome, sweetheart.”Standing by the dessert table with a flute of champagne in her hand, Felicity watches as Oliver dances with her mother. Donna’s mother-of-the-bride dress is a dark purple, and Felicity remembers the trial of shopping for it, how none of the typical dresses would do because “My baby might only get married once in her lifetime and like hell am I

* * *

Standing by the dessert table with a flute of champagne in her hand, Felicity watches as Oliver dances with her mother. Donna’s mother-of-the-bride dress is a dark purple, and Felicity remembers the trial of shopping for it, how none of the typical dresses would do because “My baby might only get married once in her lifetime and like hell am I not dressing for the occasion.”

It was a good day with her mom, and Felicity only has so many of those to hold onto throughout her life. Something about her mother just jumping in and loving Oliver from the start has smoothed things over tremendously too. Felicity’s never met her mother’s mother because the woman died before Felicity was born, but she wonders if it’s that loss that’s brought out the compassion in Donna’s heart toward Oliver, caused her to see him as a boy who lost his mom and not as The Former Playboy Castaway Oliver Queen.

Across the room by the bar, Thea and Roy are standing closer than Felicity has seen them since the night Slade’s men attacked Starling. Thea hasn’t been quiet about the fact that she wants to leave—and that she wants Roy to come with her. Meanwhile, Roy hasn’t been quiet about the fact that he doesn’t want to leave.

But they seem to have set aside their issues for the night, because Felicity _thinks_ she sees Roy’s hand settle on top of Thea’s on the bar counter.

A gentle hand on her shoulder distracts Felicity from her musings. Tommy stands next to her, his tie loose around his neck, and his hair a bit disheveled. “C’mon,” he says, with a tilt of his head. “Dance with me.”

She doesn’t even hesitate, taking his offered hand and following him out onto the dance floor. He keeps a respectable distance between them, his hand on her hip and her hand in his.

“I haven’t seen him this happy in a _long_ time,” Tommy confesses, with a glance over at Oliver. “I can’t thank you enough for that.”

“I haven’t been this happy in a long time either,” Felicity says. “I can’t believe we got here.”

“I’m so glad you did,” he tells her, giving her a quick smile.

They dance silently for the rest of the song, but her eyes never stray from his, and he doesn’t look away either.

There are many reasons Felicity is thankful for Tommy Merlyn. That he is a friend to Oliver. That he is an older brother to Thea. That he’s… that he’s a friend to _her_. The good kind. The oh-shit-how-did-I-ever-get-by-without-you kind. And that friendship with her has only a little to do with his friendship with Oliver. They are two distinct things, and they’re both wonderful.

Love isn’t a thing Felicity hands out easily. She’s ever-cautious with it. She’s constantly careful that she doesn’t accidently start loving someone who will only end up leaving her. And Tommy, well, Tommy has only ever validated her trust in him, treated it like it was precious, like he didn’t deserve it but was going to do his damndest to keep it anyway.

And Felicity loves him for that.

Staring up at him, struck by how easily he takes the lead, how the music flows around them, Felicity is overwhelmed with gratitude that she gets this moment. A three-minute dance that silently acknowledges and celebrates the importance of Tommy Merlyn in her life.

When the dance ends, Tommy leans forward and presses his lips to her forehead. Felicity puts her hands on his arms and they linger like that. “Thank you for the dance,” she tells him.

“You’re the bride,” he says, and she can hear his joy for her in the last word. “I should be thanking you.”

It’s after the next song that the DJ announces they’ll be throwing the bouquet and the garter. Felicity screws her eyes shut and carefully tosses the bundle of flowers over her shoulder.

Laurel catches it, and Felicity almost wishes she’d seen the look on the woman’s face when the bouquet sailed right to her. The photographer hurries to get a picture of Laurel and Felicity, and then Felicity’s ushered to a chair while Oliver slides his hands under her dress to remove the garter.

This time, Felicity gets to watch the little bit of lace fly through the air, and her jaw drops a little as Tommy’s hand flies up to catch it. He looks just as stunned as she feels.

They get pictures of him and Oliver, both grinning like schoolboys, and then Laurel and Tommy stand side-by-side for another photo op. Felicity can’t help but look at them and wonder. Laurel’s been quiet about her relationship with Ted for a few months now and he’s not with them today, but surely Tommy would have said something to Felicity if he and Laurel were making another go at it.

Surely they wouldn’t be carefully stepping around each other like they are right now if that were the case?

By the time they get to the toasts, Felicity’s feet hurt. She’s been awake and running around since early in the morning, and even though excitement and adrenaline has done a lot to keep her moving, her body is beginning to protest just a little. Thea is the one who suggested changing into ballet flats after the ceremony, and Felicity’s eternally grateful for that suggestion.

She sits very carefully in Oliver’s lap as Tommy raises a champagne flute and tells stories about the two of them in their youth, things that have nothing to do with what the tabloids would expect. These two men did not just party together. They weren’t casual acquaintances.

They were the kind of friends who would die for each other.

Leaning a little more on Oliver, Felicity drops her head to her husband’s shoulder, keeping her eyes on Tommy, smiling at him as he smiles at the two of them.

Raising his glass, Tommy says, “To the happy couple,” and everyone drinks.

Oliver’s hand slides up her thigh. “You have one last dance in you?” he asks.

Pressing her palm to his cheek, Felicity draws Oliver in for a kiss. “I think so,” she tells him.

The cake has been cut, the toasts have been made, the bouquet has been thrown, the garter tossed, and the bride and groom take to the dance floor one last time. Closing her eyes, Felicity lays her cheek on Oliver’s chest, and sways in time with him.

It’s John Diggle who approaches them as the song ends. Felicity doesn’t catch what he says, but he whispers something close to Oliver’s ear.

Oliver gives her a look. It’s agonized and regretful, and suddenly Felicity knows exactly what’s going on.

“Let’s leave properly so there are no questions,” she tells Oliver. So they exit the ballroom with the cheers and clapping of the guests following them, but they don’t go upstairs to their honeymoon suite. They climb into Diggle’s car and drive to the lair.

For three more hours, Felicity sits in her wedding dress at her workstation, manning the comms and rerouting satellites and breaking into security systems all over Starling while the Arrow chases down bad guys.

Four hours after leaving the hotel, Felicity collapses onto the twin bed she bought Oliver for anytime it would be too unsafe for him to come home. After only a few minutes, she hears the lock at the top of the stairs disengage; she hears Oliver’s voice saying her name and his footsteps coming down toward her.

Sitting up, Felicity watches as Oliver removes his mask and unzips his jacket. Every moment displays his exhaustion. He runs his hand through her now-messy curls. “I’m sorry,” he tells her.

She takes his hand. “I knew what I was signing up for.”

He climbs into bed with her, and she falls against his chest, struck, in her tiredness, by the contrast of her white dress and his green leathers. She’s not totally comfortable—he probably isn’t either—but she’s so tired, she doesn’t have the energy to move. Not when Oliver’s hand is against her back, and she can feel his chest rising and falling underneath her. Not when she can look down and see her wedding ring glittering on her fourth finger.

They _do_ make it to the honeymoon suite. They sneak in the next morning, after about six hours of sleep. Felicity closes the door behind her and shoves Oliver against it, kissing him desperately and thinking out loud about how she didn’t get to take off his suspenders and what a shame that was.

He did get to help her out of her dress, but that was more necessity than foreplay. She was unable to get the zipper all the way down without assistance. It’s not like he didn’t get distracted. She’s pretty sure there’s a hickey on the small of her back that wasn’t there before, and it was only her firm “no sex in the lair” rule that kept Oliver focused enough to get them back to the hotel.

Now, Felicity fists her hands in his shirt and drags him down the hallway towards the bed. He lets her, because she’s found that he secretly loves to be pushed around a bit if she’s the one doing it. And oh, _fuck_ , when he’s bossy with her intentionally in order to get her to push back, the end result is _amazing_.

She pushes him down onto the bed and climbs onto his lap. They haven’t been quick and frantic in a while, and Felicity likes it, likes pressing Oliver down onto the mattress with the palms of her hands and undoing the buttons of his shirt. She likes watching him force himself to stay still while she kisses all over his chest and slides a hand beneath the waistband of his pants.

Neither of them are gentle when it comes to getting clothes _off_. Everything after that is a blur of hard and fast and _bruising_. Felicity bites at Oliver’s shoulder and then soothes the area with kisses. She begs for more, begs for release, thrills at the harshness of Oliver’s breath and the way he whines and grunts as they move together.

After, they both flop down onto the mattress, sweaty and panting. Felicity closes her eyes and blindly reaches for Oliver’s hand. She draws it to her lips, kisses his ring finger. Her body is still buzzing.

“That was _incredible_ ,” she tells him. She’d always expected Oliver’s reaction to praise to be smugness, self-assurance. Of course it was incredible, what else would it be?

But throughout their relationship, that hasn’t been the case. Oh, she’s detected a distinct amount of pride when he’s worked her up so well and so thoroughly that she’s a desperate mess, but when she _tells_ him, when she puts into words how he makes her feel, what being with him is _like_ …

It’s not pride. It’s deep satisfaction colored with the sweetest reverence. And the fact that she’s someone Oliver Queen so _adores_ is not something Felicity takes for granted.

Oliver rolls over so he’s on his side, looking down at her. With his free hand, he draws patterns on her stomach, her thighs.

She almost protests when his hand dips lower, almost closes her legs and tells him it’s too soon, too much. But he covers her mouth with a long, deep kiss. Then he’s touching her so slowly, so carefully, that it’s not long before she’s gripping the sheets beneath her, begging him to give her more.

He shushes her, kissing her slowly, his tongue licking into her mouth, ignoring the way she whines against his lips and bucks her hips.

She throws her head back and lets out a series of breathy cries when he finally lets her fall over the edge. After she’s thoroughly and appreciatively kissed him, Felicity puts a hand on his shoulder to coax him onto his back. Wrapping her arms around his chest, she lets the touch of his hand stroking up and down her spine lull her to sleep.

When Felicity wakes up, the bed is empty. Oliver’s sitting in the loveseat against the window. He’s holding his phone to his ear, and she hears him talking in soft tones.

“Thea, please, take as much time as you need but… I wish you’d said goodbye instead of sending a text. To Tommy, at least. I know my _activities_ are a lot and you need time to adjust, but—” His voice cracks, and Felicity’s heart cracks with it. “Please call me. I love you.”

“Where’s Thea?” she asks.

“Getting on a plane,” Oliver tells her. “She… she _left_ me.”

Sliding out of bed, Felicity reaches for Oliver’s discarded shirt. It’s to fight the chill in the room, not Oliver’s gaze. “What? When?”

“She sent me a text.” He looks at his phone. “About an hour ago.”

Felicity pads across the room, so she can sit beside him. “Is she coming back?”

“I don’t—” Oliver’s voice is quiet, worried. “I don’t know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter should be up on April 21st.


	7. PART ONE: CHAPTER SEVEN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver, Tommy, and Felicity learn where Thea Queen has gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Additional warnings for this chapter have been added to the tags. Please read responsibly.

Actually being married to Felicity quickly becomes one of Oliver’s favorite things in the whole world. He loves getting to go home with her, getting to kiss her whenever he feels like it—she doesn’t mind—and even simple, stupid things, like making out on the couch for a few minutes while dinner finishes cooking, or watching her sit at her vanity and methodically apply her make-up or put on her jewelry.

It takes a bit of work, but they make their new apartment _theirs_. It requires various long shopping trips where Oliver is much more interested in the way Felicity’s shirt rides up when she reaches for things on high shelves, but they get the place repainted and decorated and a little bit refurbished. Oliver’s still getting used to regularly sleeping in a bed again—even when he was back at home he unmade the bed and then slept on the floor—but having Felicity next to him every night makes the mattress much more tempting.

The main sore spot in his life is Thea’s absence, but her texts and emails come regularly. He tries not to worry too much, tries to believe that she’ll come back when she’s ready, when space and time have healed some of her pain.

Three weeks after Thea leaves, Oliver wakes up at two in the morning when the first rumbles of thunder echo in the air. The bed next to him is empty, but he can see a sliver of light stretching down the hall from the direction of the living room, and he knows Felicity isn’t far away. It’s weird for the rain to wake her and not him, but he doesn’t question it too much. Instead, he slips into a soft, navy blue bathrobe Felicity bought him a few weeks ago and heads off in search of his wife.

“Hey,” Oliver sinks onto the couch beside Felicity, sliding his arms around her shoulders and kissing her neck. He pulls at the thin straps of her tank top, pressing more kisses against her shoulder. “Can’t sleep?”

She sighs and leans back against him, turning her head in anticipation of the kiss he’s happy to give her. “Something’s bothering me.”

Oliver frowns and looks at the laptop screen for the first time. “About Thea’s email?”

“Yeah,” Felicity taps on her mousepad a few times, moving through the most recent three pictures. “Something’s wrong.”

“With the photos?”

She bites her lip, “Yeah. I just… I can’t put my finger on it.”

“It’s three in the morning,” Oliver says. “Even your brain gets tired. Come back to bed.”

He expects a chuckle and a remark about how she knows that the last thing he has in mind is sleep. Instead, he gets: “Oliver, I’m _serious_. I’m worried about her. She never calls; she only texts.”

“She’s overseas,” Oliver says. “And she’s still dealing with finding out that I’m the Arrow. 

“There’s something in her eyes though. They look _empty_. And these pictures are…” She shakes her head. “I think they’ve been altered.”

“How can you tell?” he asks.

She emphasizes certain areas by running her mouse over them. “See here? How the pixels look different? Honestly, it’s not that great of a Photoshop job, Oliver. Better than some stuff I’ve seen on TV posters, but not by much.”

He huffs out a laugh, but it’s hollow. “All right,” he says. “ _If_ there’s something going on with Thea, something bad, something more than just a spontaneous vacation, what do we do?”

Felicity taps a few keys on her keyboard. “I can try to trace the GPS on her phone… find out the IP address of the computer that sent these emails, see if it matches her laptop, try to see where she is that way.”

“How long does that take?” Oliver asks.

“Few hours.” She tips her head back, rolling it from one side to the other. “At least.”

Gently, Oliver touches the underside of her chin. He searches her eyes. “You’re seriously worried about this?”

She swallows, her expression and her voice grave. “I am.”

He tries not to let her obvious concern get to him. Not because he doesn’t believe her, but because he doesn’t want to comprehend the fact that something is wrong with Thea.

Standing, Oliver heads for the kitchen. “I’ll put the coffee on.”

Thunder cracks in the sky above them. It sends shivers of uneasiness down Oliver’s spine. He sighs deeply. “And then call Tommy.”

Four hours later, the sun breaks over the horizon, and no one in Oliver and Felicity’s apartment has slept another wink. The coffee table is covered with papers—print-outs of Thea’s emails, hard copies of photos that she’s sent Oliver that Felicity has enhanced, copies of her credit card statements.

As soon as it became abundantly clear that something was _wrong_ , prying into Thea’s personal life became one of the best ways to find her. She hadn’t used her credit card in any of the places in Europe she was supposed to be. The hotels she’d told them she was staying at had no record of her. There were no plane tickets purchased in her name to anywhere she told them she was going.

For three weeks, she’s just been _gone_. Dropped off of the face of the earth.

And none of them had _noticed_. Because the emails were steady. The text responses were prompt. She wanted time. She needed space. Everything was too much to process.

Oliver could kill himself for letting it get this far, for letting her be missing this long without noticing.

Tommy looks about as self-loathing as Oliver feels. He sits on the very edge of one of the easy chairs, staring at one of the emails Thea sent _him_.

“Shit,” Felicity says. Her hair is a fuzz of blonde around her shoulders. The robe wrapped around her body is sliding off of her left shoulder. She wipes at her eyes. “Shit-shit-shit-shit.”

“What is it?” Tommy asks, looking up from the papers in his hands.

Felicity’s face has gone deathly pale. “I—” she starts. Oliver’s been pacing the floor behind the couch where she’s sitting, and he pauses to set a hand on her shoulder when he hears her breathing turn ragged, panicked. “I found where she landed. She’s in Corto Maltese.”

“That’s good,” Tommy says. “That’s a _start_ , Felicity.”

“It fits with the cell tower data,” Oliver agrees, “So what’s the problem.”

Felicity shakes her head. “No, you don’t understand. I found _footage_ of her leaving the airport.”

“Okay…” Tommy says, glancing to Oliver, who’s becoming more and more terrified the more flustered Felicity gets. Without another word, both of them move to either side of her, Tommy on her right and Oliver on her left.

She taps a few buttons on her keyboard, and the exterior of the airport comes up on the screen. There’s a black SUV pulled up in front, and Felicity points to the two figures walking towards it. One, Oliver thinks, does look like it could be Thea, though her hair is shorter and it’s been straightened. There’s a man with her, his arm around her shoulders possessively, and Oliver’s blood runs _hot_ with anger.

“Shit,” Tommy says softly.

Malcolm Merlyn pushes Thea into the backseat of the SUV and slams the door shut behind her. Then he climbs into the passenger's seat and out of sight.

“How in the hell is he _alive_?” Tommy demands, his eyes fixed on Oliver. “I _buried_ him.”

Numb with shock, Oliver shakes his head. “I killed him. I _stabbed_ him. I don’t—”

“It doesn’t matter,” Felicity says in a low, dangerous tone. “It doesn’t _matter_ , because the son of a bitch has _Thea_. And we need to get her back. Whatever it takes.”

“Agreed,” Tommy says softly. “Get us on the next flight.”

Felicity’s fingers fly over the keys.

Oliver gets up. He rubs his eyes, fighting exhaustion and despair.

“I’m gonna throw a bag together,” Tommy says. “I’ll be back in less than an hour.”

“You’re not coming,” Oliver says firmly.

“Like _hell_ I’m not,” Tommy snaps angrily. “She’s my sister too, and I am helping to bring her home and get her the fuck away from that monster.”

Felicity looks up at Oliver, and Oliver knows he’s lost. Arguing is only going to waste time that Thea doesn’t have. “I’ll call Dig,” he says.

“And Roy,” Felicity tells him. “Four is better. You both need someone watching your six.”

Silently, Oliver agrees. Roy is just so close to this, so _crushed_ at the way Thea left. She pushed him so hard to leave Starling, and he wouldn’t, or he couldn’t. He’s been angry and hurt, and Oliver knows enough about his protégé to know that part of that anger and hurt stems from how much Thea cut everyone out when she took off.

Oliver used to think that the fact that Thea left _both_ of them in the middle of the night meant she hadn’t completely forgiven him, but now that he knows Malcolm has her…

That changes everything.

Setting her laptop back down on the coffee table, Felicity walks over to him. She wraps both of her arms around one of his, pressing her chin against his bicep. “You’re going to get her back,” she says.

“She’s been gone for _weeks_ ,” he reminds her. “Malcolm has had his hands on her for _weeks_. Who knows what he’s done? What he’s planning?”

“I don’t know,” Felicity says. “I do know that Thea is his daughter, and that as sick as that man’s definition of love is, he won’t do anything _he_ thinks would hurt her. He certainly wouldn’t kill her.”

“He murdered five hundred people, Felicity." Oliver can still smell the smoke as the Glades burn, still see the rubble and the flames casting an eerie glow against the sky. "Just because he thought they were beneath him. He doesn’t care about human life. He doesn’t care about _her_.”

“But we do,” Felicity says. “And we’re gonna get her back.”

* * *

 

Their five-man team of Oliver, Diggle, Tommy, Roy, and Felicity lands on the ground in _Corto Maltese._ Laurel has to be in court all week, or Tommy is sure she would be with them.

Malcolm is keeping Thea in a house on the beach. Felicity was able to find it easily once she realized who had Thea.

The beach makes approaching the house difficult. Felicity ends up re-tasking a satellite in an attempt to figure out where Malcolm’s men are. She jerry-rigs together a working computer system in the back of the van with—for all Tommy can tell—gumption and duct tape.

Crouched down behind some of the bushy plants on the edge of the property, Tommy fusses with the comm unit in his ear. He’s still not used to wearing them. They’ve been doing a perimeter check for the past _hour_ , and he’s antsy. Oliver and Dig are both better at this, and even Felicity is more equipped to determine where Malcolm’s gaps in security are, because she has the layout and the thermal imaging.

Tommy just wants to get _Thea_.

They have to wait for the opportune moment, but once it arrives, all four of them move quickly. Diggle and Oliver split off first, taking out the two guards patrolling the east side of the house. From there, Tommy and Roy stay hidden underneath the second-floor balcony, by the lower level’s sliding glass door. While Felicity walks them through hacking into the security system, Diggle and Oliver work on neutralizing the guards along the north and south. If all of them move fast enough, they can get in and out with Thea before anyone sounds the alarm.

“I have heat signatures all throughout the house,” Felicity says. “Several are following what is clearly a patrol pattern, only two haven’t moved in the past hour. One appears to be in the basement, the other is upstairs.”

“Oliver and I should take the one upstairs,” Dig says. “That one’s more likely to be Malcolm. You two get Thea. Felicity, do your best to keep them off of the radar.”

“Gotcha,” she says. “Be careful boys.”

Tommy and Roy make it inside without a hitch, but over the comms they can hear Diggle get pulled into a fistfight outside with two of the guards. Oliver rushes to his aid.

“Felicity,” Tommy hears Oliver say over the comms. “We got this. Get them to Thea.”

There’s a distinctive _thud_ of a body hitting the ground.

“Okay,” Felicity says. “You have to make it down two hallways before you reach the door to the basement. One is through the door directly in front of you. Move quickly; Oliver and Diggle are drawing their attention, but it won’t last long.”

There’s a guard at the end of the first hallway that Roy hits with a tranquilizing arrow. They fight two more at the end of the second hall. With the back of his hand, Tommy wipes blood from the corner of his mouth as he steps over the two bodies on the floor. One of them makes a move like he’s going to get back up—keep fighting even with the bullet in his thigh—but Tommy kicks, and the heel of his boot meets the man’s jaw. He doesn’t move after that.

Roy wraps his hand around the doorknob and opens the door that leads to the lower level.

Gun held low, finger off the trigger, Tommy slowly makes his way down the basement stairs, listening for the sound of a guard approaching. When he reaches the bottom, he has only a few seconds to take in the room. It’s wide open space, a cement floor, sunlight streaming in from the high, rectangular windows that are just above the ground.

And there, on the other side of the room, is a _door_. The hinges are on the outside, and beneath a grimy window, a two-by-four held by metal brackets bars it closed. Tommy heads that way immediately, Roy at his back. There doesn’t seem to be anybody else down here—maybe the guards stationed upstairs were the only ones watching this place?—but still, Tommy moves fast. Removing the two-by-four is easy, so is unlatching the two locks at the top of the door, but the deadbolt poses a problem until Roy shoves him out of the way and with a gruff, “Let me.”

Tommy figures that letting the guy most experienced in robbery and burglary take the lead in this instance can’t possibly be a bad idea. “Headquarters,” he says, speaking to Felicity. “I think we got her.”

The two men rush into the small enclosure at the same time. There’s not much inside this room either—a metal bucket in the corner, a ratty looking twin mattress on the floor with an equally tattered blanket, and an unmoving brunette chained to the wall by the ankles. Tommy’s stomach rolls. The girl—Thea, please be _Thea—_ doesn’t even stir as they enter, and that scares the life out of him. She’s curled up, knees to her chest, arms wrapped protectively around herself.

For a moment, anger flashes through him so hot and red Tommy swears there’s no limit to the pain he could and would—and will—inflict on Malcolm for this.

He and Roy exchange a quick look before Roy gestures for him to approach. Roy turns back to the entrance. Carefully, Tommy kneels on the cold floor, whispering, “Thea.”

She turns her head. Her eyebrows furrow; she mouths his name. Covering her mouth with her fist, she lets out a hollow, dry cough.

Tommy’s gaze slides down her body. She’s wearing a stained tank top that was probably once red, and a pair of black denim shorts with a large rip up the side of one leg.

“Oliver,” Tommy hears Roy say. “We found her. It’s Thea. We’re getting her out of here.”

“We’re gonna get you out of here,” he promises, finally daring to touch her cheek. Tommy glances over at Roy, who has a bent piece of metal shoved into the lock on the manacles around Thea’s ankles.

Her bare feet are dirty; the nail polish is chipped. Thea grabs for him with equally dirty hands, pressing his hand against her face with his palm. “You’re _here_ ,” she rasps out.

“Yeah,” he tells her, voice thin and wavering. “I’m here. I got you.”

There’s the _clatter_ of Thea’s chains hitting the floor as Roy disdainfully throws them aside. “Gotta go,” he says.

“I’m gonna carry you,” Tommy tells Thea softly. “That okay?”

She looks so _tired_ , so _drained_. Like every minute here has been sucking the life out of her. “Yeah,” she says, licking her lips and holding out her arms. Tommy tucks one arm beneath her knees, uses the other to support her back. He can feel her trembling in his arms. “We’ll keep you safe,” he says.

Roy ascends the stairs first, bow drawn. Tommy can hear Felicity giving him directions, but she sounds so far away.

He needs to get Thea out of here. He needs to get her out of here _now_. Tommy tightens his hold on her.

They run into a guard at the top of the stairs, and Roy shoves an arrow into his thigh before his fist hits the man’s face. From there, it’s a simple matter of backtracking down the two hallways they used to get there.

“Oliver and Diggle are gonna cover your route to the van,” Felicity says in Tommy’s ear. “Move fast.”

Everything blurs after that. Tommy remembers his lungs aching as he sprints towards the van with Thea heavy and precious in his arms. He remembers the sound of gunfire, the beat of his feet against the ground. He remembers Felicity opening the back doors of the van.

He remembers sitting on the floor in the vehicle, his back against the wall, Thea’s back against his front, his hands brushing sweaty, dirty hair away from her face while she fights for every breath. He remembers Felicity putting her hands on Thea’s knees and telling her to try to match her breaths to Tommy’s, then giving Tommy a pointed look as if to tell him to breathe easy.

It was easier said than done, but he _did_ it. Oliver jumped in the back with them, Diggle and Roy hopped into the two bucket seats up front, and Thea leapt into her other big brother’s arms as they sped away.

Tommy remembers the echo of gunfire that followed them.

After they get back to the safe house Lyla set up for them, it’s an unspoken understanding between the men that Felicity is the one to help Thea clean up. While they’re in the restroom, Oliver sews up a cut on Tommy’s shoulder and fills him and Roy in on their side of things.

Malcolm wasn’t there.

“He let us take her back,” Oliver says. “There’s no way this went down that easily. He _let_ us get her back. That’s the only explanation.”

“He was done with her,” Diggle agrees. “Probably just wanted the two of you to take her off of his hands.”

“But why?” Roy asks. “Why take her in the first place? If he wanted her for blackmail or ransom, he needed her in his possession.”

“We’ll have to talk to Thea about that,” Oliver says. Off of Tommy’s incredulous look, he amends, “Once she’s back in the States. Once everything has settled. Once she’s safe. Not a moment sooner.”

Tommy nods his agreement.

With a tiny knock, Felicity pushes the door to the room open. “She’s asleep,” she says quickly. “She showered, and she’s in clean clothes, and she’s sleeping.” Felicity sighs deeply, presses her thumb and index finger to her forehead. “Which is probably about the best thing we could ask for her, given the circumstances.”

“How does she—” Oliver’s voice breaks. “How does she look physically?”

“She’s lost weight. A few cuts and bruises, but nothing major that I can _see_ ,” Felicity says. She wrings her hands. “I’m worried… She was only semi-lucid. Do you think he could have been drugging her to keep her calm?”

“I wouldn’t put it past him,” Tommy says, as Oliver turns away from the group and starts rummaging in one of the duffle bags. He pulls out an old bag of what Tommy’s heard Felicity call “Oliver’s Island weeds”.

“Next time she’s awake,” he says, already getting to work on grinding them up, “These will help her detox.”

“We’re on the first plane out,” Felicity tells him. “Do you think Malcolm will make getting out of the country difficult?”

“Not if he let us take her,” Diggle says, his expression sober.

Roy pushes past all of them as he heads into the adjoining room. Tommy watches as he sits on the opposite side of the bed Thea’s sleeping on. He looks away when he sees Roy adjusting the covers around Thea’s shoulders, making sure she’s sleeping comfortably.

_She’s safe now_ , he reminds himself, even though it doesn’t _feel_ like she’s safe. It feels like Malcolm still has his claws in her, still has a trump card to play.

Oliver’s miracle herbs _do_ flush out whatever drugs were in Thea’s system, but they don’t help them find any more answers.

The last thing Thea remembers was Oliver and Felicity’s wedding. The rest of the time she was gone is a huge, gaping black hole of nothing. On the one hand, Tommy’s perversely grateful that she doesn’t remember how they found her, doesn’t remember that room or the way it smelled or how badly their father treated her.

On the other hand, the loss of her memory is just another way Malcolm has violated her, and Tommy _hates_ him for it.

Diggle is correct though. Malcolm doesn’t do anything to keep them in Corto Maltese. The five of them get on the plane and land in Starling City without any problems.

Roy doesn’t leave her side as they travel, and it doesn’t escape anyone’s notice that Thea spends most of her time holding onto his hand for dear life. When it’s not Roy’s hand in hers, it’s Tommy’s hand or Oliver’s hand that she seeks out, as if she’s looking for a tether to reality.

She looks normal: Her hair is styled, she’s done her make-up, and while the clothes Laurel suggested they bring with them still _fit_ her, they’re clearly just a bit larger on her now. She holds herself together carefully, with tremendous effort.

On the couch in Oliver and Felicity’s apartment, at three in the morning, Thea finally breaks down.

It’s like watching a building collapse. It happens almost in slow motion, the first breaks in the structure are Thea’s tears when Felicity brings her tea. Then Laurel arrives, clearly having gone home from work but not yet gone to bed. Because she’s _Laurel_ , all quiet compassion and gentle understanding, Thea doesn’t really stand a chance.

For a very long time, all Thea can do is scream. It’s a horrible, heart-twisting sound. The only sound in the room. It echoes in Tommy’s ears for nights afterwards.

Laurel wraps her arms around the girl’s body; Tommy presses his palm against her back. Oliver’s hand is on the top of her shoulder. Felicity kneels on the floor in front of them all and puts her hands on Thea’s knees. On the other side of the room, Tommy hears Roy’s fist hit a wall. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Diggle guiding Roy into the kitchen. Roy’s face is red, and his eyes are blotchy with tears.

Silently, Tommy vows that if he ever sees his father again, he’ll kill him for this.

And he won’t think twice.

* * *

 

Oliver and Felicity go to a little place called Jefferson’s for coffee and bagels almost every Sunday. Crime doesn’t exactly take a day off, but it doesn’t usually rear its ugly head during Sunday brunch.

The Sunday after they get Thea back, Felicity wakes Oliver up by running her fingertips down his spine. It takes a little while, but it means that he wakes up with a soft smile, instead of with panic in his eyes. He’s been, not broody, but despondent since Thea came back. She’s struggling, and Felicity knows that Oliver hates to see that. He doesn’t know how to help, so his first impulse is to smother her.

Felicity’s going to do her best to make sure Oliver _doesn’t_ follow that impulse. Thea’s been through so much, but she needs normalcy. She needs to feel capable and competent in her own skin. Malcolm took that away from her.

He took away her trust in _herself_. That’s a hard thing to earn back; Felicity knows.

Sleepily, Oliver reaches for her, wrapping an arm around her hips to draw her closer. “Morning,” he says, his voice husky.

He kisses her, slow and easy. Felicity’s fingertips brush against the scar tissue on his lower back. She sighs into his mouth, pressing herself closer. “You know what I want?” She asks, letting her voice drop, arching her eyebrows.

“What?” He asks.

“Cinnamon bagels,” she tells him. “With honey walnut cream cheese and _coffee_.”

He chuckles, sneaking another kiss that is _not_ quick. She hums contentedly, pushing at his shoulder so he rolls over onto his back. Climbing onto his lap, Felicity takes his face in her hands, thumbs stroking his temples.

They keep their hands over their clothing, kissing at a leisurely pace, each content with the give-and-take.

Thea and Laurel are camped out in their living room, and they still have to find Malcolm, still have to help Thea, still have to figure out what her father is planning.

But to do that, Felicity knows, Oliver needs _this_.

Not just the sex, although that is—Oliver’s fingers flex against her spine, and she shivers—really good. Oliver needs connection. For that matter, Felicity does too. His touch is grounding, steadying. He’s real and safe and here. She could just lay with him, trading lazy kisses, all morning.

Finally, Oliver’s palms go still against her thighs, and Felicity sits back.

“If we don’t stop now,” he says, reaching up to trace his fingers along the waistband of her pajama bottoms, “We won’t.”

“I know.” She sighs. “Let’s go see if Thea and Laurel want coffee and bagels too.”

She looks down at him, sees the way his face darkens at the reminder of what his sister’s been through “Hey,” she says. “There are few things that a freshly made bagel can’t cure. She’s strong. She’s gonna be okay.”

“I hate that it even _happened_ , Felicity.”

“You _cannot_ blame yourself.” It’s almost an order. If she orders him to do it, maybe he’ll listen. Maybe he’ll obey. Oliver’s need to protect the world extends to his personal relationships; he takes any bad circumstances onto his shoulders as if they were personal failures.

He still wakes up in the middle of the night crying out for his mother. Felicity has learned by now, if it storms or rains, she’s going to hear him thrashing about in the middle of the night.

Drawing his left hand to her mouth, Felicity kisses the knuckle right above his wedding ring.

“I’m trying not to,” Oliver tells her, and since that’s way more than what she expected, she lets him have that.

“It’s hard feeling helpless.” She traces the Bratva star with her thumb. “I know. Sometimes I feel that way when you’re… out there.”

He covers her hand with his own. “You are the best partner I could have asked for. My eye-in-the-sky. Keeping me safe. My lifeline. My home.”

His eyes shine as he looks at her. Once upon a time that level of devotion would have terrified her. Now she brushes her fingers across his forehead. “You’re my home too.”

Their lips meet again, and she melts into it.

They walk the two blocks to the restaurant. Usually, when it’s just the two of them, Oliver links his fingers through Felicity’s. They don’t generally talk until they get to the restaurant.

This time, Oliver walks beside Thea. He’s on the side closer to the street, so that she’s between him and the buildings. Laurel and Felicity fall into place behind them.

“She slept,” Laurel tells Felicity quietly. Both women have their ears more tuned in to Thea and Oliver’s conversation, which is stilted, but about things that aren’t Thea’s abduction. “She woke up a few times, but she _slept_.”

“That’s good,” Felicity says, but something in Laurel’s face worries her.

“I’ve seen a _lot_ working at CNRI.” Laurel’s eyes drop from Thea’s back to the ground in front of them. She seems to be choosing her words carefully. “She’s going to need time. She’s going to need support and love, and people to notice when she needs to talk.”

Felicity nods along with Laurel. She’s certain that none of their group is unaware of the struggle Thea is facing. It’s the degree of understanding between all of them that differs. “I wonder if talking to Oliver would make it easier or harder,” she muses aloud.

Oliver has been held against his will. He hasn’t really spoken much to her about the circumstances, but she knows it’s in his history. She’s not sure how long it was or if he’s even really recovered from it. He’s still recovering. He’s spending his every minute recovering, whether he wants to or not. It’s just the way things are.

Every day things get a bit better. Felicity hopes it will be like that for Thea. It needs to be.

“Does she know where she wants to stay?” Laurel asks. “She’s welcome to come stay with me, if she wants. I wouldn’t blame her if she chose to stay with you two or go to Tommy’s.”

“She hasn’t said,” Felicity answers. Even if they _got_ her apartment back, Felicity can’t quite see Thea ready to go back there, ready to be completely by herself. “You should ask her yourself. She’d probably rather not be dealing with a middleman.”

“I don’t want to overwhelm her,” Laurel says. “Though I’m not sure there’s anyway around that.”

They walk the next block in silence, and then out of nowhere, Laurel says, “If she’s anything like me, she wants a fight.”

“A fight?” Felicity asks, unable to look at Thea and see anything but the dirty girl Tommy carried to the van in his arms.

“It’s one way of regaining control. Sometimes I find it in a courtroom, one time I found it… well, in a street filled with masked supervillains.” They stop at a streetlight and wait to cross. Felicity remembers how Laurel looked in her sister’s borrowed mask the night Slade’s men terrorized the city, and she nods. Laurel continues, “Thea and I have always had that in common. If we can’t use our fists, we’ll use our words.”

When they arrive at Jefferson’s, Thea declines coffee, only eats about a fourth of her bagel, but manages to drink most of the juice she orders. Oliver holds onto Felicity’s hand beneath the table.

Felicity turns Laurel’s words about Thea over in her head as she eats her bagel. While Oliver and Laurel talk about her job at the District Attorney’s office, and Thea plays with the straw in her empty cup, Felicity takes out her tablet and types out an email to Cisco.

A week later, three boxes shows up at the apartment. Felicity lifts the lid of the first one and pulls out a dark red hooded jacket and matching pants. In the second one is a beautiful bow with red-tipped arrows.

Inside the third, the smallest, is a red mask. Beneath that is a note:

_A costume fit for a Red Arrow. Whenever she’s ready._

Felicity smiles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next update should be on April 28th.


	8. PART ONE: CHAPTER EIGHT

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Malcolm's plans for Thea are revealed.

Thea puts her life back together with the same strength Tommy has seen her use to do everything. After a few nights bouncing between his place and Oliver and Felicity’s apartment, she ends up deciding to take Laurel up on her offer to move in.

In a weird way, Tommy’s relieved about that. He loves—loved—many things about Laurel. Oliver might keep people safe, but Laurel knows how to make them _feel_ it. She walks into the room and carries with her a certainty that everything is going to be okay. He doesn’t blame Thea for being drawn to that, for needing that. He’s just glad she has it.

It doesn’t mean she turns into a stranger. She calls and texts and talks to him about everything under the sun. He offers her her job at Verdant back, but she waits a few weeks before taking him up on the offer.

She doesn’t go near the basement door. Tommy can’t fault her for that. If she wants her life disconnected from the war her brother fights at night, that’s her decision.

For a while, all he knows about her relationship with Roy is that it’s rocky. Roy blames himself—he’s so much like Oliver and so against admitting it. Thea never tells Tommy what changes between them, but they do end up back together.

One night, after they go out for dinner and Tommy walks her home, he asks her why she’s still in Starling when she’d talked about leaving before.

“I spent enough time away from home,” she tells him. “Enough time away from people I loved, people who loved me.”

“Maybe you’ll get the traveling bug again,” he tries, looking to make her eyes light up the way they used to when she talked about seeing the world.

“Maybe,” is all she says, in a sad sounding tone. He doesn’t bring it up again. They still don’t know why Malcolm had her, and Felicity can’t find him. It’s terrifying to Tommy that there’s somewhere on this earth that Felicity can’t find someone. Scarier still is the fact that his father appears to be in possession of this ability to hide from one of the smartest women Tommy knows.

It’s a chilly day in December, three months after Thea’s return, when they finally get answers.

“It’s my father,” Tommy announces as he jogs down the stairs to the Arrowcave. “He’s here.”

Something inside Tommy is smarting over the fact that after all this time spent looking for him, Malcolm just up and waltzed through what is essentially their front door.

Oliver’s rage and fear is almost imperceptible, but Tommy picks up on it instantly. “Where?” Oliver asks.

“Upstairs,” Tommy says. “By the bar. He says he only wants to talk.”

“What the hell could he possibly want to talk about?” Felicity’s expression is murderous. “His abduction and abuse of his daughter?”

Tommy shrugs. “Probably.”

The look she gives him is only slightly less murderous. “Well can we just kill him instead?”

“Believe me,” Tommy says, “I would _like_ to, but considering his usual MO, it might help us to listen before we do.”

“I don’t like it,” Felicity says.

Oliver presses a Glock into her hands. “If he comes down here, shoot him. Don’t ask questions.”

Solemnly, she nods, and there’s no doubt in Tommy’s mind that she’ll do it. It should probably scare him more than it does. Instead all he feels is relieved.

Pressing up on her toes, Felicity plants a quick kiss on Oliver’s cheek. “Don’t die.”

Tommy looks away. Sometimes the two of them look at each other and he’s painfully aware that he’s not in their little world, doesn’t share in the connection that exists between them.

Malcolm has cracked open the good Scotch by the time Tommy and Oliver make it upstairs.

“Oliver’s here,” Tommy says, his tone icy with anger. “Say what you want to say.”

“Oliver.” Malcolm holds out a tumbler to him. Amber liquid sloshes in the glass. Oliver keeps his arms crossed and silently refuses it. Shrugging, Malcolm sets it down on the bar rather than offer it to Tommy. “Nice to see you again.”

“Give me a good reason why I shouldn’t kill you where you stand for what you did to Thea?”

Malcolm sneers. “I can give you _several_. One of them is standing next to you.”

“Don’t not kill him on my account, Oliver,” Tommy says brusquely. “After what he put my _sister_ though, he doesn’t deserve to be spared because of some misguided claim to _fatherhood_.”

Malcolm’s lip curls, and Tommy steels his gaze, determined not to let any hurt from his father’s resentment show. “I did what I had to do to protect her and you. I didn’t have a choice.”

“Like hell you didn’t—” Oliver takes a menacing step forward; Malcolm holds up a hand.

“Please,” he says. “Let’s skip the unpleasantries.”

“Not possible,” Tommy quips, and that seems to settle Oliver. “Every moment with you is unpleasant.”

“The hell do you want, Malcolm?” Oliver snaps.

Malcolm downs his drink in one gulp. He points his forefinger at Oliver. “I want you to kill Ra’s al Ghul.”

“You must be out of your fucking _mind_ ,” Tommy mutters.

“I went around Ra’s when I set off the earthquake device in the Glades,” says Malcolm. “He’s not entirely _happy_ with me.”

“You mean the fact that you killed over five hundred people and intended to kill even more,” Tommy says.

Malcolm gives him a sharp look. “Your—” he gestures to Oliver— “mother told Ra’s what I’d done in the Undertaking. And now he’s out to spill my blood.”

“Good,” Oliver and Tommy both say at the same time. Oliver advances towards Malcolm, his hand reaching for the man’s throat. Tommy’s vaguely aware of his phone buzzing in his pocket.

“Check your phone.” Malcolm is, as always, unshakeable, but Tommy catches the hint of a tremor in his voice. Malcolm’s hiding it well, but he’s _scared_.

Tommy reaches for his phone and taps on the screen. Ice cold fear slithers through his veins.

“Oliver,” he says, his voice shaky.

It’s Thea. Dressed in a black hood and holding a bow and arrow, but definitely Thea. The person she’s aiming at is wearing a uniform that’s unmistakably League. He’s tied to a concrete pillar, his wrists bound over his head.

Tommy doesn’t know him, but Oliver whispers, “Maseo.”

Thea empties her quiver into the man’s chest, then turns. The camera catches a clear glimpse of her face, of glazed over eyes and the hard set of her mouth.

Tommy can hear Thea’s sobs echoing through his living room. He can feel her shaking in his arms, crying about how she killed him. She couldn’t stop herself. It was like her body didn’t belong to her anymore. He remembers stroking her hair and promising her that everything was going to be okay. That Malcolm couldn’t hurt her anymore.

“I told her it was just a _dream_ ,” Tommy lifts his eyes from the screen to his father. “I told her you were a monster, but that there was no way in _hell_ you would do something like this to her.”

“You’ve heard of a plant called Vitura. It grows in South America; in fact, it thrives in Corto Maltese. making the subject highly suggestible,” Malcolm says smugly. “Your little sister killed one of the League’s Lieutenants. He was practically Ra’s’ right hand man. Ra’s won’t stop for explanations; he won’t _care_ about the circumstances. He will demand blood for blood.”

Anger blazes in Tommy’s chest. Flooded with a rage the likes of which he’s never known, he’s certain in this moment that he could kill his own father without hesitating for a second.

“You’ve given her a death sentence.” Oliver’s voice is quiet, anguished, horrified.

“What I’ve _done_ is given you incentive.” Malcolm steps forward, chin high, chest out, shoulders back. “Step forward. Take her place. You’ll be given trial by combat. Kill Ra’s al Ghul, and all the blood debts from his reign will be washed away.”

“Including yours,” Tommy says bitterly.

“I should kill you.” Oliver’s voice sounds almost unfamiliar. It’s not the harsh, low voice of the hood. It’s desperate and terrified, panic and anger and helplessness twisted together.

Malcolm throws his arms widely. He turns in a slow, beckoning circle. “You’re welcome to try. Kill me, and the video goes live anyway. You have bigger problems.”

And just like that, all of the anger built up inside Tommy _explodes_.

“You’re a coward,” Tommy screams, as Malcolm turns his back on them and heads for the exit. “You spend my whole life telling me I’m weak, but you’re too scared to fight your own battles. You have to turn your own _daughter_ into a killer. You’re the one who’s _weak_.”

Malcolm stops and slowly faces them again. His lip curls in disgust. “And we both know that it will be _Oliver_ who saves Thea, not you.”

The words hit like a slap. Tommy recoils, shame momentarily dispelling his anger.

“Saves me from what?”

Tommy turns in the direction of Thea’s voice. She stands at the entrance to Verdant. Her hands are balled into fists at her sides.

Instinctively, Tommy moves toward Thea, his goal to get between her and Malcolm as quickly as possible. Oliver goes for Malcolm.

Both of them are too late.

Malcolm grabs his daughter, twisting her arm behind her back and pressing the blade of a knife to her throat. Thea lets out a scream of pain that brings all of Tommy’s feelings of hatred for Malcolm back up to the surface. Thea draws up her leg in an attempt to stomp on Malcolm’s foot, but he twists his body in a way that must put more pressure on her arm, because she lets out another distressed cry.

“Don’t—” Tommy says brokenly.

“See?” Malcolm spits. “Weakness.”

Oliver tries to gradually shift closer to Malcolm, but he notices, turning so Thea’s body shields him from Oliver. “Stay back.”

“You can’t kill her.” Tommy flinches when Malcolm glares at him. He knows that look. His body knows that look; it wants to tense up, hide his mind away, just get through the pain that happens next.

But no. No, Thea is here. Tommy can’t let her down. “You need her alive for your plan to work.”

If possible, Malcolm’s glare becomes even more venomous. Tommy’s right. Tommy’s right, and his father knows it. With a growl of frustration, Malcolm shoves Thea forward and makes a run for it. Tommy grabs his sister and holds onto her tightly; Oliver races after Malcolm.

The door slams behind both of them. Thea trembles in Tommy’s arms.

“What did you mean?” she whispers. “What did you mean he needed me alive?”

Tommy hesitates. The truth is ugly. The truth will _hurt_ her, and that’s the last thing he wants to do.

But she deserves to know.

It’s hard to get the words out, to explain what has happened while Thea stands in front of him, shaking, stronger than Malcolm would ever give her credit for. Oliver returns in the middle of Tommy’s explanation, standing awkwardly on one side of the room. When Tommy shoots him a pointed glance, Oliver shakes his head. Malcolm got away.

“This isn’t your fault,” he tells her, once he’s done, feeling for all the world like he just tore a hole in his middle and slowly pulled out all of his insides. “It’s Malcolm’s fault, not yours. _He_ did this, and you need to remember that, Thea.”

She nods, but he gets the sense that between her brain knowing that Tommy is right and her heart feeling like he’s wrong, her heart is the one that is winning.

Thea pulls away from him, pacing. Panic rises steadily in her voice. “So now I have to go… I have to go fight this... _Raz_ person?”

“Ra’s,” Tommy says, making sure to pronounce it clearly. Ray-sh. “And that’s not going to happen.”

“If I don’t go,” she crosses her arms, “What happens?”

“One of us can go,” Oliver says. “One of us can take your place.”

“No,” Thea cries, whirling around at him. “No, I don’t want you to. Not for me.”

“I’ll be fine, Speedy,” Oliver says, and Tommy bristles at the thought that he’s just _assuming_ he’ll go, even though Oliver makes the most tactical sense.

It’s not like Tommy’s been training to fight with swords recently. Or ever.

“It’s nothing I can’t handle.”

“Oliver…” Tommy starts, but Thea is gone. She turns on her heel and runs for the door to her office. It slams behind her. Both men stare after her, but ultimately, they let her go.

Oliver puts a hand on Tommy’s shoulder. “Malcolm’s wrong. You and I both know you would die for Thea, for anyone you love.”

“Nobody is dying for Thea,” Tommy says, moving closer to Oliver, studying him intently. “Nobody is _dying_. Not you, not me, not Thea. We just have to figure out a way out of this.”

“Everyone dies,” Oliver says softly. “Eventually.”

* * *

Felicity’s the one who texts Tommy— **FS:** _Please stop him_ —and Tommy doesn’t even hesitate. He doesn’t ask for clarification or context. He knows what she’s talking about, and he knows what she’s asking him to do.

And it’s his baby sister and the person who’s been closer than a brother to him his whole life, so she knows he’ll do it.

Tommy finds Oliver in the lair. Thankfully, he’s only a few rungs up on the Salmon Ladder, not doing some of the other ridiculous things Tommy’s walked in on. At least there’s no giant tire and sledgehammer today. “What the _hell_ , Oliver?”

For his part, Oliver looks not-at-all-surprised, as if he knew that telling Felicity he was about to go participate in a fight to the death with one of the world’s most unkillable assassins would naturally mean she’d tell Tommy. “It has to be me,” he says, letting go of the bar and dropping down to the floor.

“No,” Tommy argues, “It really doesn’t. I could go. Sara could go. It does not _have_ to be you.”

“She’s my sister.” Oliver says it incredibly matter-of-fact. She’s my sister and I get to die for her.”

“She’s mine too,” Tommy counters, pushing into Oliver’s space. “You don’t have a monopoly on her protection.”

Oliver throws his shoulders back and meets Tommy’s gaze with a steely one of his own. “You know which one of us stands a chance of coming back alive, and we both know that person is me.”

That stings, but Tommy doesn’t let it stop him. “And you know which of us she needs more, which one _everyone_ needs more. Your sister, your wife. Hell, Oliver, even the _city_ needs you more. I am the one who is expendable.”

It’s amazing how Oliver can go from muted anger to shouts of pain in only a few seconds. “You are not expendable to me.” He settles down seconds after the outburst, and follows it up with a soft, “I almost lost you once; don’t ask me to do it again.”

Oliver looks defeated, chin down, eyes on the floor.

Grief squeezes at Tommy’s chest. “I _did_ lose you once.”

Now Oliver looks up at him. “I came back. And I will come back this time.”

Tommy wishes he knew how to believe that. The more important thing is that Oliver believes that.

“Were you even going to tell me?” Tommy snaps. “Before you left?”

Oliver purses his lips before he flatly says, “No.”

Tommy pulls his hands into fists. “You would have just abandoned all of us? Just like that? No goodbye?”

“I knew you would stop me if I told you.”

Scoffing, Tommy shakes his head. “Screw you, Oliver. That’s not your decision. And _fuck you_ for being willing to walk into certain danger without telling anyone goodbye.”

“I’m saying goodbye now,” Oliver says. “I can do this, Tommy. I can win. I just. I need to know that someone is here looking out for them. Keeping them safe. Making sure they’re okay.”

Silently, Tommy nods. He can do that. “I’ll keep them safe if you keep yourself safe.”

Oliver’s smile is sad. “I can do that.”

They hug. It’s not quick. It’s long and almost gentle. Tommy closes his eyes and rests in it.

They back away from one another slowly, neither able to look at the other. Tommy can’t bear to think that this is the last time. It’s only been a little more than two years of having Oliver back. That’s just not enough.

A lifetime wouldn’t be. And he’s greedy. He wants a lifetime and no less.

Tommy chuckles, but there’s no humor in it. “Duels suck.”

* * *

 

Felicity is the last person to see Oliver before he goes to the dueling ground. She stands in the lair, shivering, her arms wrapped around herself.

“I hate that you have to do this,” Felicity says. “I hate that I couldn’t get in and erase that video. I hate that none of us noticed that things weren’t right when she left. I hate that _this_ is the only way to protect Thea.”

Oliver stops packing the tan canvas bag. “I know, Felicity.” He walks over to her slowly. Wrapping his arms around her, he kisses her forehead. She leans into him. He’s warm and solid, and the lair feels so, so cold.

“I’ll come back,” he tells her, running one of his hands down her hair soothingly. “Thea will be okay.”

She tucks her face into the side of his neck and sighs into his chest. “I wish that sounded more convincing.”

His arms tighten more around her. She doesn’t want him to let her go. Leaning back and tipping her chin up, she lets him kiss her long and slow. “I need you to do something for me,” she whispers against his mouth.

He kisses the underside of her jaw. “If it’s you asking, I’ll do it.”

Oliver’s lips have found the spot on her neck that makes her go weak at the knees, but she’s not about to be distracted. “You have to kill him,” she says. “You have to kill Ra’s al Ghul. There isn’t another choice.”

“I know.” He leans back to look at her, caressing her cheek with his hand. “Right now I’m only certain about two things. The first is that I will do whatever it takes to protect my sister.”

“And the other thing?” Felicity asks. She holds onto the back of his jacket, like that will keep him here with her.

“There’s nothing on this earth that could stop me from coming back to you,” he vows.

_Except death_ , she thinks. But giving in to that thought is not a good idea right now. She knows he’s thinking it already, knows he’s considered the possibility.

And, well, if this is the last time she’s going to see her husband…

She runs her hands down his chest, pulls a little bit at the zipper of his sweater. Just enough so there’s no mistaking what she’s about to ask him. “How long before you have to go?”

“Long enough,” he says, and _oh_ , the way he kisses her then means he got her meaning just fine.

Still, they don’t exactly take their time. She pulls frantically at his clothing as together they stumble toward the lair’s twin bed. His undershirt comes off with his sweater, and then he’s beautifully shirtless. She can explore his abs with her fingers and watch him shiver as she dips her hand lower, traces the lines of his hips and against the waistband of his pants. She couldn’t possibly ever tire of touching him, of having him touch her.

Impatient, Oliver cups the back of her left thigh with his hand and lifts it up, pulling her body tightly against his. He slides his arm up around her waist and rocks into her. The friction is _delicious_. They both groan at the contact, the pressure. Oliver repeats the motion with her right leg, but she’s not expecting it.

She slips. Her arms were only loosely held around his neck, and her left leg slides down his body since he’s not holding it anymore.

They break apart chuckling. The seconds of levity ease the desperation, the worry, but only somewhat.

As the backs of his knees hit the end of the bed, Oliver sinks down onto the mattress. He toes off his shoes. Felicity follows, using both her hands to pull off her shirt and toss it aside as she climbs onto his lap, placing a knee on either side of him.

“I love you,” he says as she grinds against him. His fingers press firmly into her hips. “I love you, Felicity. Felici—”

She cuts him off with a kiss, sliding her fingers into the hair at the back of his head.

“I know,” she whispers breathlessly. “I know, Oliver.”

Pushing at his shoulder until he falls back onto the mattress, Felicity scoots backwards just enough to reach for his belt. She unbuckles it with quick fingers.

She slides off of his legs and onto the floor. Obligingly, Oliver lifts his hips to help her pull his pants and boxers off.

Standing, she shimmies out of her jeans. Propped up on his elbows, Oliver watches her with dark, hooded eyes. She presses her thighs together, desire making her hands shake as she unhooks her bra.

“C’mere,” Oliver whispers. “Come here, Felicity.”

The air is chilly. It hardens her nipples and makes shivers run down her spine. She steps closer as he sits up and reaches for her. His mouth and hands are hot against her skin as he palms one of her breasts and sucks lightly at the other. He slides his other hand beneath her panties, rubbing his fingers gently through her folds.

She hums, content for the moment. His callouses make the press and slide of his fingers against her that much better. The scratch of his beard against her sensitive skin is an incredible sensation. Her body throbs in want of more. More of his mouth, more of his fingers on her clit, more _inside_ her.

She can’t think about this maybe being the last time. She can’t think of this as being a goodbye. She can’t lose him.

Always in-tune with her headspace, particularly during activities of this nature, Oliver slows his movements and looks up at her. “Sweetheart?” he asks. “Felicity? Are you with me?”

He waits while she takes a few deep breaths, trying to banish the fear wrapped around her chest. “I can’t lose you. I _won’t_. I can’t, Oliver—”

“Hey, _heyheyhey_ ,” his voice is quiet, soft. A tone reserved only for her. He gazes at her tenderly. She can feel how he loves her like it’s a tangible thing. A softness created between them in their moments together. It’s a tether from him to her, built steadily through the bad and the good, the easy and the difficult.

But the reassurances he whispers in her ear feel hollow. There’s a very real chance he will not be coming back to her. She’s been trying to be supportive, trying to appreciate how he cares about Thea.  All while the selfish part of her heart just wants him to come back alive. Or not leave in the first place.

It takes a few moments to bring herself back into the moment, back to Oliver’s hands on her skin and his hushed, frantic promises in her ear. They need this, these last few moments of intimacy.

Because if Oliver is going to survive, he needs to remember vividly what he’s coming back too. What’s worth living for. _She’s_ worth living for. _She’s_ worth fighting for.

And her husband is a fighter. A survivor. He _will_ come back to her. He will.

Centered now, back in the present, she leans into Oliver’s touch. He picks up on the change quickly and goes back to rubbing her clit just how he knows she likes.

“I’m ready,” she tells him. “I’m _so_ ready for you, please, Oliver.”

He doesn’t move as quickly as she’d like, so she slips her hand between their bodies and wraps her fingers loosely around his length. His reaction is instantaneous and sends a proud thrill through her. Soon her underwear is on the floor, they’re both back in a better position on the bed, and she’s lining him up so he can slide inside her.

She rides him for a bit, moving in a way that she knows feels good for them both. Even with the pleasurable tingles flowing through her body, she isn’t quite satisfied. It’s good, but she wants something different.

Oliver must be thinking the same thing, because he puts an arm around her midsection and turns them over, letting the weight of his body press her into the mattress. For a moment he’s still, and she’s grateful, trying to burn the memory of how he feels around her—inside her—into her brain.

He presses his lips to hers, slides his tongue into her mouth. He’s just barely thrusting inside her, tiny, shallow movements, like they have all the time in the world.

Which they don’t. Their time is quickly running out.

“You feel so good,” she tells him, looking him in the eye so he gets the full impact of the praise. “You make me feel so good; c’mon give me more.”

His breath is harsh in her ear as he acquiesces, muttering words she can’t decipher along with ones she can, like her name and _fuck_.

“That’s it,” she says, trailing her fingers up his spine. “Just like that. Make me feel you. Come on, Oliver. You feel so good. A little faster now.”

He’s shaking from the effort of holding back for so long, but he obeys when she tells him to move faster.

When he starts whimpering her name in a pleading tone that never fails to send a bolt of heat straight through her, she knows he’s close. She reaches down for her clit, but he pushes her hand aside, rubbing her with his thumb instead.

All she can do is let herself be surrounded by the intensity of the sensations, by the heady feeling of Oliver’s body pressed against hers. She feels held together by the tiniest of threads, only a few moments from flying apart at the seams.

It’s Oliver making eye-contact with her that sends her orgasm crashing through her. She arches her back and digs her nails into his skin as she comes with a cry. He’s a few thrusts behind her, four, five, then a low, satisfied groan before he collapses on top of her.

They stay like that for a long time, pressed as completely together as possible.

“Don’t you dare not come back,” she whispers. “Do you hear me, Oliver? Don’t you _dare_.”

He doesn’t say anything, but his arms are tight around her and he’s shaking and his face is pressed between her neck and shoulder.

There’s not much time left. They hold onto each other for as long as they can, then they dress in silence.

Silently, Felicity sits on the bed and watches Oliver walk through the last of his preparations. When he’s done, he comes and kneels in front of her. Without a word, he takes her hand and turns it so her palm is up, and sets his wedding ring in the center of her hand.

Felicity feels punched in the stomach. She opens her mouth, but no sound comes out. Oliver closes her fingers around the gold band. She can tell he’s struggling to keep his composure. “I need you to keep this safe,” he tells her, voice burdened with emotion.

Felicity puts her hand on his chest, over his heart. She doesn’t bother to fight her tears as she leans forward to softly kiss his mouth. “I will. I promise.”

And then, because there’s no way to say it too much or too often, not when affection is almost a foreign concept to her husband, she says, “I love you. I need you safe. Kill Ra’s. Come back to me.”

In the last few minutes before Oliver has to leave, they stand at the bottom of the stairs. He kisses her forehead one last time, running his hand from her shoulder to her wrist and giving her palm a gentle squeeze. Felicity closes her eyes as his fingers slip through hers. When she opens them, he’s gone.

* * *

_One._ The sword pierces his chest, and Oliver thinks of his father telling him to  _survive_ .

_Two_. The sword is ripped back out, and Oliver tastes blood. He thinks of his mother, of the sound of her voice and the feel of her hugs. _Soon_.

_Three_. Ra’s is speaking, but either the words aren’t in English or his brain has given up making sense of language. Oliver thinks of Thea and the way she hugged him when he came back from _Lian Yu_.

_Four_. Glancing down at the red blood sliding down his bare torso. Hugging Tommy. Laughing with Tommy. _Tommy_.

_Five_. Ra’s boot against his shoulder, a hard push, and— _Felicity_. Felicity’s smiles. Her voice, her laughter, her lips against his. _Kill Ra’s. Come back to me._

He falls.

Oliver wakes up with the taste of a bitter liquid in his mouth, up his nose, in his _lungs_. Panic takes less than a second to set in. He kicks his legs, stretches his arms up, and his fingers touch air, then stone. He kicks harder, presses his palms to the flat surface and pulls himself up and out of the pit he was in.

Braced on his hands and knees, Oliver falls onto concrete, naked, coughing up mouthfuls of a black, thick liquid that feels like acid on his skin.

“Welcome back,” a voice says.

It takes Oliver minutes before he can suck enough air into his lungs to respond. “Where am I?”

“Nanda Parbat.” Oliver knows that voice. It’s the voice of the man who killed him.

“What am I doing here?” he manages to ask.

“Repaying a debt.”

“I paid Thea’s debt.” He moves his hand to his ribs where he was stabbed, runs his fingers over the raised scar that’s there now. How long has he been gone? Do his friends all think he’s dead? Does _Felicity—_

“With your life. A life which we have restored. Now it is _you_ who owes us.”

Oliver pushes himself up onto his knees and stares up at the Demon’s Head. Ra’s eyes are dark. His face is angular and haunting in the flickering firelight. Ra’s eyes are the thing he’d remembered as he fell. Oliver has stared evil down many times throughout his life. He knows what it looks like.

Oliver wipes at his mouth with his hand. “I didn’t ask to be saved.”

“It wasn’t your choice to make,” Ra’s says, beginning to walk a slow circle around him. “You forfeited your life to me. The choice was _mine_. Death is a release that does not belong to Oliver Queen. Yet.”

There are no weapons in the room. There are guards standing by a securely-locked door. At this moment, in this room, there is no escape.

“And what is your price?” Oliver asks bitterly. “For this _restoration_.”

“Your name.” Ra’s is back in front of him. “Oliver Queen is dead. The man who kneels before me is _al Sah-him_.”

* * *

 

**_END OF PART ONE_ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now that we're through the first part of the fic, I'm going to be taking a break for a few weeks while I do some necessary work on the second part, in addition to tackling some awesome-but-time-consuming real life drama. I wish I could say for certain when _Husbands_ will return, but I'm not entirely sure. (During that break, keep your eyes peeled for an _I Dream Of Felicity_ update.) When I settle on a return date, I'll be sure to post it on my tumblr (andyouweremine), so you can check there as well. I'm always happy to answer questions about this 'verse or any others.
> 
> Thanks for all the love you guys give this fic. It means a lot to me!


	9. PART TWO: CHAPTER NINE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone deals with the aftermath of Oliver's duel with Ra's.

 

[ ](http://tinypic.com?ref=2cdhl4x)

 

 

The waiting is the hardest part. Oliver’s only been gone for six hours. (The duel can’t have even begun, her husband is still alive, still breathing.)

Felicity closes her fist around Oliver’s wedding band and presses her fingers against her mouth. Thea sits with her, legs tucked beneath her on one corner of the couch. A grey blanket—one of Oliver’s; the man hated to be cold—is draped over her legs.

Neither of them are paying particular attention to the movie playing on the TV. Felicity feels like her stomach is tied up in knots, but she’s done crying. She cried as soon as the door shut behind Oliver. It was a good release of tension that left her eyes feeling puffy and achey and her heart not feeling any better.

She forces herself not to check her tablet, not to look for communications from Sara. After everything, it’s not surprising to Felicity that Oliver wanted Sara with him. Sara has the most connections to the League, as well as the skill set to get Oliver home if he’s injured after the fight with Ra’s.

If he’s alive.

Felicity shoves that thought away. Of course he’s alive. The duel can’t have even started yet. His wedding band burns in her hand. She has to give it back to him. She has to keep it safe until he gets back.

And he’s coming back. He said he would. She has to believe that or she’ll go _crazy_ while she waits. Holding Oliver’s ring in her left hand, she reaches for her wine glass with her right. She’s not sure if the drink is helping her calm down or winding her up more, but either way, she’s not sleeping tonight. Her head is too busy, thinking of Oliver out there in the wet snow—he hates the snow the same way he hates the cold. She thinks of him and Sara on top of a mountain, in the freezing snow.

She glances at the blanket covering Thea’s knees. She wishes Oliver was here. She wants Oliver here.

It’s a want that’s frustrating in its unattainability. She can’t _have_ Oliver here, but she wants him, so badly she could scream at the wrongness of his absence.

The wine settles uncomfortably in her stomach. She hasn’t eaten much. Thea brought over salads, but they both picked at them. Felicity sets her wine back down on the small blue coaster on the coffee table.

“I remember this,” Thea says softly. “This feeling. It felt like the end of the world when I was twelve. Oliver was _out there_ , somewhere, and nobody could find him. I hate feeling helpless.”

Felicity understands. She wants something to do, something to put her hands on. Waiting just isn’t good enough. “He’s coming back,” Felicity says, but the words feel as hollow as she does.

“I know,” Thea says, like they haven’t shared this exchange thirty times during the past two hours. “He came back last time.”

Opening her left hand, Felicity glances down at the ring in her palm. She traces her right index finger around its circumference. It suddenly strikes her as very wrong that it’s not with him. It’s supposed to stay with him. Forever. That’s what it meant when she put it on his finger. It’s supposed to stay with him until the moment he dies.

So he can’t die today. He can’t.

He’s not wearing his wedding ring. He has to come back for it.

She just has to keep it safe.

She’d tried to get work done for the first few hours after Oliver left, but Diggle finally pulled her away from her workstation and told her to go home. Oliver would be okay, but he needed her to take care of herself while he was gone. Thea called a few minutes later, and the girls’ night from hell was born.

It’s hell, because Sara isn’t here, neither are Laurel or Lyla, and Felicity’s husband is fighting a tyrannical monster in charge of a secret organization of assassins to the death.

And Felicity couldn’t go with him. She couldn’t. But she wanted to. She said ‘until death’ and she meant it. In a weird way, she wants to be there with him. If Oliver dies. In his last moments on earth, she wants to be there. She deserves to be there, to hold his hand. She understands why she can’t, but that doesn’t stop the want, the need.

At the same time, how could she watch him die? How could she survive after that?

“We need a distraction,” Thea says. The credits of the movie are rolling and Felicity can’t even recall what movie it was or how it ended. “ _I_ need a distraction. I just want to hit something.”

It’s like a sign. Felicity holds up her index finger as she pushes the blanket off of her lap. Thea watches silently from the couch as Felicity heads for the master bedroom. Kneeling down, she retrieves the three boxes from underneath the bed, stacking them on top of each other in her arms.

When she returns to Thea, she places the packages on the coffee table, then starts by handing her the smallest of the bunch—the mask. She figures it’ll be self-explanatory.

Felicity pretends not to notice the way Thea’s hands shake when she opens the box. The action triggers a memory, and suddenly she’s in the past, watching as Oliver opens a similar box with a green mask inside.

Thea turns over the mask in her hands, gently sweeping her fingers over the material. “It’s beautiful,” she says.

“Open the next one,” Felicity tells her, climbing back onto the sofa and wrapping the blanket back around her legs.

With careful hands, Thea lifts the bow from the box. She touches the red-tipped arrows almost reverently. “I haven’t held a bow in…” she shakes her head, gripping the weapon and drawing the bowstring back to her nocking point. “It’s been a while.”

Since the day Slade’s men took over Starling. “Maybe it’s time you picked it back up again.”

Slowly, Thea releases the tension on the string. “Maybe you’re right.”

The third box holds the suit—the jacket, the _hood_. Thea slips in one arm, then the other. She laces up the front, and this time her hands aren’t shaking. When she’s done, she smooths the material, puts the mask in place, and lifts the hood.

“How do I look?” Thea asks.

“Like a hero,” Felicity tells her. “Like a Red Arrow.”

For just a moment, Thea smiles. Then it fades a bit. “You know, I don’t think I want to be called the Red Arrow.”

Felicity can live with that. “What do you want to be called?” she asks.

There are tears in Thea’s eyes. “I think I want to be called Speedy.”

* * *

For the first two days of Oliver’s captivity, he doesn’t see another human soul. They shove his meals in through a slot at the bottom of the door. His right leg is chained to the center of the floor and his wrists are shackled together, but he scoops up bread and broth with his fingers and licks the bowl clean. Only the high, thin windows betray the passage of time. Oliver watches the shadows creep across the brick floors twice.

He spends a few hours demanding to see Nyssa al Ghul or Sara Lance, screaming at the top of his lungs until he realizes no one can hear him. Then, when his throat can’t take it any more, he falls back onto the floor, staring at the ceiling. There’s nothing but him and this cell—barely large enough for him to stretch out from toes to fingertips—and the eerie quiet.

Oliver knows how to survive captivity. He knows how to draw himself inward and let time move around him, how to let the days pass and keep his sanity intact. He’s done it before.

He’d just never wanted to do it again.

He keeps his brain busy with nonsense, counting the tiles on the floor, the bricks in the wall. He tries to strategize, figure out every possible way out of this situation. (And why, he wonders for long hours, would Ra’s bring him back only to throw him into a cell? What purpose does this serve? Unless it is to break his mind, his will. In which case, Oliver could be here for a long time.)

And when he gets truly desperate for mental stimulation, he thinks of Felicity. He doesn’t want to think about her here, doesn’t want to draw her into this world. She’s the best kind of secret: the reason to survive. She’s better than revenge, better than a legacy he never wanted anyway. She’s _hope_. She’s hope for a better tomorrow, a new beginning.

Oliver closes his eyes and thinks of blond curls between his fingers, of the softness of her mouth beneath his. He remembers her nails digging into his skin, remembers sinking to his knees in front of her, running his hands down her thighs, kissing the soft skin right below her belly button.

There’s so much of Felicity to remember, so much he committed to memory long ago. He stares at the empty place on his left ring finger and remembers her slim fingers wrapping tightly around his ring. He wants to go to her with a desperation that consumes him. He wants to throw his arms around her and spin her in circles, laugh and cry into her hair because he didn’t die. Again. He came home, again. She can put his ring back on now.

But eventually the imagining fades to nothingness, and Oliver returns to the boredom of his cell. Night falls, and he sleeps, dreaming of the sharp pain of Ra’s’ sword in his lung. He wakes up gasping, bolting upright, fingers skimming along the place on his skin where the blade stabbed him.

On the morning of the third day, men dressed in League garb come to Oliver’s cell. They lift him by his arms and drag him down a series of hallways and into a large chamber lit by torches.

“ _Ta-er al-Safar,_ ” Oliver whispers, his voice hoarse. “I want to speak to her.”

Neither of the men act like they’ve heard him. He tries again, “I demand an audience with _Nyssa al Ghul_.”

This is also ineffectual. “My daughter is in no position to help you now,” Ra’s’ voice says from behind Oliver. “And she has released your little bird back into the wild. _Ta-er al-Safar_ has flown home.”

Sara’s in Starling. Oliver almost breathes a sigh of relief. It’s not that he doesn’t trust the rest of his team—he’s used to trusting them with his life on a nightly basis—but Sara thinks like the League. She’ll know how to protect them from it, if Oliver’s resurrection has put them in danger. Besides, Malcolm is still on the loose and still hunted by Ra’s. Oliver doesn’t doubt that the man would go after Thea again if he thought sending her _other_ brother into a duel to the death with one of the greatest assassins in human history had the slightest chance of working out in his favor.

“What do you want from me?” Oliver asks. His voice sounds strained and ragged. Unaffected by the way he struggles, the men tie his arms so he’s forced to stay still.

Ra’s circles him without bothering to answer his question. Then he walks toward a large fire in the center of the room and lifts what looks like a long fire poker from the flames. The tip has been fashioned in the shape of an arrowhead, and it glows an orangish-yellow from the heat of the fire.

“I want to celebrate your rebirth,” Ra’s says, moving behind Oliver. “Make you new. You were good before. I’m going to make you even better.”

He presses the brand to Oliver’s skin. Agony bursts through Oliver’s right shoulder. The pain is enough to make his brain go blank. It doesn’t take any thought to scream.

* * *

The first week that Oliver is gone—not dead, and she clings to that distinction for all she’s worth—Felicity’s life falls into an awkward pattern. She goes to work. She goes to the Arrowcave in the evenings. She exhausts herself so sleep might find her just by chance.

She returns home to an empty apartment, to Oliver’s clothes in her closet and his towel still hanging up in the bathroom.

And she waits. For a sign. For _anything_.

There’s no limit to the leads she will hunt down. As the days tick by she becomes more and more desperate for proof. One way or another. She just needs to _know_.

And then, ten days after Oliver first left, Sara returns to Starling. Felicity is in the Arrowcave when she arrives. She hears the access code, hears the beat of Sara’s boots on the stairs.

She’s lived with Oliver long enough, lived with danger and threats enough, that she knows there is only one pair of feet. Only one person coming down the stairs.

And it’s not Oliver.

The steady sounds of Diggle and Roy sparring slowly ebb away. The _thwack_ of Thea’s arrows piercing tennis balls stops. Tommy and Laurel’s conversation halts.

Slowly, Felicity rises to her feet and turns around to look at Sara Lance. Everyone else follows her example.

Sara is dressed in her League gear, crowned from head to toe as _Ta-er al-Safer_. The hood of her robes is thrown back. In her left hand, she holds a sword coated in dried blood.

Nobody moves. Nobody breathes.

The sound of the blade touching the table feels as loud as a gunshot.

Felicity’s knees buckle. Blindly, she reaches out for something to hold onto. Her hand lands on the arm of her chair but it spins away from her. The ground seems ready to swallow her up, and for a second Felicity welcomes it. Oblivion, numbness, seems preferable to feeling anything else.

Someone’s arms wrap firmly around her, and it takes a second for Felicity to process that it’s Laurel who has her.

Felicity’s not sure how she ends up back in her chair with a cool compress at the back of her neck, but she does. Sara kneels in front of her. The robe is gone, but her hair is still pulled back from her face and her expression is stony.

“I’m sorry,” she tells Felicity.

And just like that, a switch flips off in Felicity’s brain. “How?” she whispers. “Tell me everything.”

While Sara speaks, there’s nothing but silence from the group gathered around them. No one breathes a word as the tale is told.

Oliver was stabbed in the chest, then Ra’s kicked his body off of a cliff. Sara saw everything. It’s why Sara went, after all.

When Sara talks about Oliver’s face in his last moments, it’s of a man at peace. A man who waited for death for six years and finally tasted it. The thought makes Felicity’s heart snap in two.

He didn’t have his wedding ring. When he—

He didn’t have it.

Taking Felicity’s hands in hers, Sara says, “I’m sorry I couldn’t bring him back to you.”

There are tears in both their eyes. Felicity’s vaguely aware of Tommy putting his arms around Thea. John’s hand is on Laurel’s shoulder. Roy has turned away from all of them.

Seeing them hurt intensifies the spearing pain in Felicity’s chest. It burns and aches to the point where she can’t stand it. She needs to get out.

Someone—several someones, probably—offers to drive her home, but she waves them off. She can’t add their suffering to hers right now. It’ll destroy her.

Laurel walks her to her car. She hugs Felicity tightly for a long time. She promises to call in the morning. She makes Felicity promise to call if she wants to talk in the middle of the night.

Going back to their apartment presents a different set of challenges. Oliver’s shoes are by the doorway. His towel is still hung up in the bathroom. His favorite coffee mug sits in the dishwasher. Two balled up shirts are in the laundry hamper in the bedroom, and before she even thinks about it, Felicity reaches down and pulls one out. She presses it to her face and inhales, and for a second, Oliver’s right there in front of her. Tears flood down her cheeks.

She brushes her teeth and stares at his toothbrush sitting unused in the cup beside the sink. She reaches into the medicine cabinet for dental floss and sees Oliver’s anxiety meds next to her birth control.

When she crawls into bed, it’s on his side. The sheets smell like him. Felicity presses a pillow to her chest, keeping his shirt close. She closes her eyes and she can practically hear Oliver in the bathroom, hear the running water as he brushes his teeth, swishes around mouthwash. She can picture it with ease. She can picture him crawling into bed behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist, nuzzling the back of her neck, kissing her skin.

Felicity cries until she can’t anymore. She screams into a pillow until her throat is raw.

She doesn’t get out of bed the next day. Twenty-four hours, she tells herself. That’s what she gets.

Then she’ll pick herself back up, start to put herself back together, and get back to saving the city. Because Oliver started this by himself, but she’ll be damned if she doesn’t stick around to see it through to its completion. And what they have been doing hasn’t been enough. It’s a tiny bandaid on a gushing wound. It’s just enough to keep the city from falling apart completely, but it isn’t helping it get any better. In Oliver’s absence, Tommy and Diggle have both been going out in the Arrow suit. Thea and Roy take the light patrols, and Laurel’s started wearing Sara’s jacket more and more.

For a long time, Felicity keeps looking. Oliver doesn’t die that easily. Oliver’s alive. Oliver’s coming back to her, because he _promised_ he would. She’s examined the sword and tested the blood on it—it’s Oliver’s—but that means _nothing_. It’s a crawl instead of a run, but she’s moving in a direction.

After a long weekend of barely eating, barely sleeping, and more Red Bull than could possibly be healthy, Felicity wakes at 8PM when someone starts pounding on the apartment door. She yanks it open and immediately regrets it because she looks like a total mess. Wrapped up in a bathrobe, hair poofy and tangled, with her mascara smeared, anyone who looks at her can probably tell she cried herself to sleep last night and woke up crying. All she wants to do is cry. It only sort of helps, but it’s all she wants to do.

“Why are you here?” she asks.

Later, she’ll realize that Tommy looks about as bad as she does. Unkempt hair, tired eyes, wrinkled shirt. He doesn’t answer, but he holds up a bag of Chinese food and Felicity steps aside to let him in.

They eat chow mein and egg rolls in silence. Felicity cracks open a fortune cookie.

 _Rejoice with new beginnings_. She scoffs at it and crumples it up before she throws it away.

Together, they put the leftovers in the fridge. Felicity offers to make coffee, but Tommy declines. The silence stretches out in front of them. Felicity thinks it’s kind of like grief: huge and monstrous and overwhelming.

Finally, Tommy clears his throat. “I can’t do this alone again.”

She waits. Listens.

“I did this alone when I lost him the first time. I can’t do it again, Felicity. _Please_.”

She stands in her kitchen with dirty dishes piled high on the counter. There’s a pizza box on the coffee table in her living room. She needs to sweep, vacuum. Do a load of laundry. Each task feels as difficult as climbing Mt. Everest.

She’s used to dealing with tragedy alone. Her father left, her mother shut herself in her room, and Felicity cried herself to sleep. Cooper died, and Felicity dove into isolation and emerged completely reinvented. She is no stranger to being alone, but _this_ loss is unthinkable.

She puts her hand on his, and in a voice that sounds very small she says, “I don’t think I can do this alone either.”

Things get better after that.

* * *

The sun shines brightly on the day of Oliver Queen’s second funeral. The casket is empty, again.

Well, almost empty. There’s a compartment in the lid that holds a green arrowhead and a green mask. Only a few people know about that. It’s a secret Oliver has literally taken to his grave.

Tommy tries not to think about where Oliver’s body actually is. Imaging him at the bottom of a snowy ravine isn’t any better than imagining him at the bottom of the dark ocean. It feels cruel, somehow, that he was taken so completely from them not once, but twice.

Tommy sits in the front row of uncomfortable white wooden chairs directly next to Thea. Felicity—Oliver’s… Oliver’s _widow_ —is on Thea’s other side. On Felicity’s left, Donna Smoak dabs at her eyes with a handkerchief. Tommy keeps his gaze everywhere but on the two of them. He’s so scared that if he looks at them, he’ll lose whatever composure he’s currently holding onto.

It’s a very different funeral from Oliver’s first. That was a strange sort of affair, covered by the media and attended by people who could barely be considered acquaintances. This company today, sitting in the sunlight in the middle of the cemetery, is much smaller, more intimate.

In a way, Tommy wants the funeral over as soon as possible. It can’t end soon enough. On the other hand, however, once it’s over, that’s _it_ . Oliver’s gone. It’s final. It’s accepted. _Again_.

Tommy already tried to figure out how to live in a world without Oliver Queen once. He’s not looking forward to doing it again, especially now because Felicity— _Felicity_.

She shut down her last search for him last night. Tommy was there in the lair when she pushed the button and the computer flashed an “Are you sure you want to cancel this search?” message at her. He’d put his hand on her shoulder as she pressed the “y” button. She’d turned her body into his, hiding her face against his breastbone. Very carefully, Tommy had placed his hands on her back, rubbing gentle circles.

Now he holds himself very still. The tie around his neck feels like a noose. _Your funeral blew_ , he told Oliver after he came back from _Lian Yu_.

This one somehow hurts even _more_.

As the service comes to a close, Tommy follows the line of people and tosses a handful of dirt onto Oliver’s casket. He pauses there, staring. A little ways away, Felicity is wrapped up in the arms of her friend Barry Allen. A woman Tommy doesn’t recognize stands beside them, with her hand on Felicity’s shoulder. She must be Iris West.

Laurel comes to stand next to him, a handful of black soil in her right hand.

“Is it weird if I thought that was really nice?” Laurel asks him softly. “I just… I didn’t come the last time. It’s odd to think that I’d end up regretting that. I was so angry.”

“Understandably so.” Tommy looks down at the dirt splattered across the top of the shiny, polished wood of the casket.

“Still,” Laurel says. “I never told him goodbye. I never gave myself that chance.”

Laurel slowly opens her hand. The dirt falls from her fingers. “Goodbye, Oliver Queen,” she whispers.

Tommy thinks about how different it is to pay his respects to _this_ Oliver, an Oliver Tommy almost didn’t get the chance to know. He still needs that Oliver. _Starling_ still needs that Oliver.

Starling City won’t even remember Oliver as the Arrow. They’ll never know what he did to save them, what he sacrificed. They’ll never know that Oliver Queen died to save his sister. His _real_ death was for Thea.

Instead, he’ll be remembered as a tragedy. Oliver Queen, the boy who survived drowning at sea, died on a hiking trip in the mountains. His body was never recovered.

How tragic. How sad for his widow. But that’s all.

During the walk back to the cars, Thea takes Tommy’s hand. “Don’t go anywhere on me,” she whispers. “Please. I couldn’t take it.”

“I’m not planning on it,” he tells her. He looks at the path ahead of them, at Felicity walking side-by-side with Donna, mother’s arm around daughter’s waist.

He thinks of Malcolm at Oliver and Robert’s funerals, thinks about how both those funerals and this one were ultimately his father’s fault. “But Thea…”

“I know,” she says. “I know Felicity’s looking for Malcolm.”

“If she finds him…” He doesn’t know how to finish. He’s not asking permission, but all the same, he wants Thea’s approval. He’s not planning on dying, but it’s unwise to underestimate his father. Any confrontation Tommy has with him might very well end with his own funeral.

“You’ll go after him,” Thea finishes. “I _know_. Just be careful.”

Tommy draws her close, presses a kiss to her forehead. “I will be.” He bites his tongue to keep from calling her Speedy. He knows that’s the name she’s chosen for her evening persona, but he can’t help but feeling like he’s taking something from Oliver by using it. He’s always felt that way, if he’s honest.

There was no one to blame for the Gambit going down, as far as Tommy knew during those five years Oliver was away. But there’s someone to blame now. There’s Ra’s, who pulled the trigger, and Malcolm, who loaded the gun and cocked it.

Tommy might not be able to do anything about Ra’s right now, but he can go after Malcolm. He can get Thea her freedom back. He can get _himself_ his freedom back.

The food at the reception tastes like chalk. Tommy eats excellently prepared chicken and vegetables, and watches as Felicity and Thea receive condolences.

They talk about Oliver, sticking to the happy stories. Felicity laughs through her tears. She doesn’t eat much—Tommy notices—but then she doesn’t really have many opportunities to. People come up and offer their condolences, say a few kind things about Oliver, and as soon as one person is gone another person shows up.

It’s decided, through a strange series of events involving Thea taking off with Roy and Donna needing to catch a plane and no one wanting to let Felicity drive if she doesn’t _have_ to, that Tommy will take the mother and daughter to the airport and then get Felicity home.

Tommy drops them off at the curb, then makes a beeline for the temporary parking so Felicity and Donna can say goodbye without him there.

It’s once he’s thrown the car in park that a burst of grief and longing hits him all at once. He just wants Oliver here. He wants Oliver with an intensity that is angering because he knows he can’t _have_ Oliver back. Not this time.

Tommy slams his fist against the steering wheel. His eyes burn with tears, and he ducks his face down, trying to find some level of composure and failing. Taking long, deep breaths doesn’t help. He just hurts, all of him. There’s so much of it and at such a high intensity that it’s overwhelming. It crashes over him, and he drowns, sinks down without even possessing the strength to fight it.

The tone of his cell phone has him hastily wiping his eyes. It’s Felicity. Donna just went through security, so could Tommy come pick her up now?

He taps out a quick _yes_ and turns his attention away from the searing pain in his chest. He can do what Oliver wanted. He can keep Felicity and Thea safe. He can make sure they’re okay.

Felicity is quiet as she climbs back into the car. Her arms are wrapped around herself, and as Tommy starts to drive back to her apartment, she turns away from him, staring out the window at nothing. The silence could be uncomfortable, but it’s not. Tommy doesn’t want to talk. He doesn’t want to fight tears and hear his voice crack. He just wants to _be_. And existing next to Felicity is easy. Effortless.

He doesn’t ask if she wants him to walk her up to the apartment, he just does it, just like he just does the perimeter check and returns to tell her the place is clear. She nods and mumbles a _thank you_. During the ride back from the airport, she’d started to take her hair down out of it’s up-do. Her curls are a bob of friz around her face. She’s holding her earrings and necklace in her left hand, and she’s kicked off her heels, so she stands with her feet flat on the floor. She’s seems so much shorter, so much smaller.

Without really thinking about it, Tommy puts his hand to the back of her head and tugs her close. Heaving a great sob, she falls against his chest, curling her fingers around the fabric of his shirt and holding onto him for dear life.

Just like that, Tommy’s tears are back. He doesn’t have words for how he feels, but he suspects it’s much like Felicity feels. Empty. Drained. Alone.

In another lifetime, he would have hidden the fact that he was crying from her, tried to be strong and supportive. He would try to be what she needs.

But he can’t, and he doesn’t want to try. He just—damnit, he wants to _hurt_ , because he’s lost something important and it _hurts_. And feeling that hurt means something. If Oliver didn’t matter, Tommy wouldn’t be crying. Felicity wouldn’t be crying.

But Oliver did matter. He mattered a _lot_ to both of them.

So Tommy rubs Felicity’s back and lets her cry into his shirt while he cries into her hair. He knows the second she realizes he’s crying with her, because she pulls back just a touch, tipping her head up to look at him. Reaching up a hand, she touches his cheek. There are tears in her eyes and tears in his.

And they look at each other and _understand._

They said they’d do this together. And they are. This is how.

Tommy spends the night on the couch. Felicity asks him to, because she doesn’t think she can handle being alone. It’s a little too much right now. Tommy doesn’t want to go home to his empty apartment anyway.

In the morning, he makes her toast she barely eats and a mug of coffee that she sips at numbly as they sit together at her table, in the quietness of the apartment.  

When she’s finished the coffee, Felicity looks up at him, her eyes blazing with a determination that’s terrifying. “I’m going to kill him,” she says coldly. “I’m going to kill Malcolm Merlyn.”

“I know,” Tommy tells her. “I’m going to help you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ll be traveling for my brother’s wedding next week, so the next update will be June 23rd.


	10. PART TWO: CHAPTER TEN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The recovery process begins.

After Oliver’s funeral, Felicity turns her attention from trying to find Oliver into trying to find Malcolm Merlyn. It’s not as simple as revenge. It’s self-defence.

If Felicity had what Malcolm had… the ability to blackmail anyone who cares about Thea into doing his bidding, he could use them all as his patsys. There’s no end to what Tommy or Roy or Laurel or Felicity herself would do to keep Thea safe. Even if Oliver’s death got the League off of their backs for the time being, there are countless other things Malcolm could have on Thea. He had her for _weeks_.

It needs to end. _They_ need to end it.

Tommy can’t live his days scared of his father. He won’t.

So Felicity searches, and Tommy trains. This is not a fight he’s going to sit out. He won’t let someone else fight this for him.

Felicity is ruthless in her hunt for Malcolm. She freezes his accounts, transfers money away, tracks down any of his known associates and convinces them not to give Malcolm any assistance. Essentially, she ensures that even if they personally can’t kill him, his life will be hell until one of his many enemies kills him for them.

But in the end, it’s Tommy. It was always probably supposed to be Tommy.

Malcolm doesn’t exactly slip up; it’s more that he walks right into a trap of Felicity’s creation. The bait is that _one_ account she left alone, the very well hidden one that Malcolm likely suspected she would never be able to find. She decimates the rest of his holdings, robs him _almost_ blind, but leaves that one account pristine. Untouched.

And she traces it right to him, right to the hotel on the outskirts of Metropolis where he’s booked a room.

With only a quick text to Dig and Laurel for possible backup, Tommy and Felicity go by themselves to ambush him.

Malcolm opens the door to the room and jumps back in surprise when Felicity clicks on the light next to the chair where she’s sitting. There’s a gun aimed at Felicity’s head before Tommy can even blink. She doesn’t even flinch.

“I’ve always wanted to do that,” she confesses lightly, gesturing to the room and the light. She quickly adds, “You got sloppy.”

With amazing speed, Malcolm manages to school his face into something cold and impartial. From his position by Felicity’s side, Tommy only sees his father’s surprise and horror for a split second.

“You can’t touch me,” Malcolm sneers. “I still have information on Thea—evidence.”

“If I believed that,” Felicity says, drumming her fingertips on the arms of the chair, “You might have a chance. But you wouldn’t be running around like a rat in a maze if you thought you had anything that could leverage us to help you.”

“I’m not exactly on your guest list,” Malcolm says. “I know that.”

He shifts his stance, both hands on the Glock now. Seemingly without a care, Felicity looks away from him, calmly reaching for her tablet on the nearby table. She taps on the screen a few times, pulls up a menu, and—

A small incendiary device on the wall behind Malcolm explodes. Without hesitating, Tommy dashes forward in an attempt to twist the gun out of his father’s hands. But Malcolm’s quick. Even though the weapon falls to the floor, Malcolm gets in a good hit to Tommy’s ribs. With pain lancing up his side, Tommy almost doubles over, but he fights through it, pushing himself back to his feet.

Years ago, he would have hit the floor. He would have curled in on himself, waiting for the blows to end, waited for Malcolm’s angry words to fade away.

Not now. Now he keeps himself on his feet. His father is attacking him the way he always has. He doesn’t know how much Tommy has trained, how he can no longer kick him to the floor and just lash out without  a care.

And since Malcolm expects nothing more of Tommy—nothing remotely close to the damage Oliver would be inflicting on him if Oliver were here—Tommy is able to land the next blow easily. He feels the success in every cell of his body.

He has never, not ever, struck his father for striking him.

Once the blow has landed, Malcolm’s entire demeanor changes. His stance shifts, his eyes narrow, his lips curl into a sneer.

And for just a moment, Tommy thinks he’s going to lose. Malcolm is going to beat him until he breaks, leave him nothing but blood and bruises on the carpet. He’ll sneer and spit out that Tommy asked for this.

Tommy dodges the next blow, backing up to keep his footing sure. He’s not so lucky the next time. Malcolm charges, the length of his forearm slamming against Tommy’s throat, shoving him into the wall. He keeps his body far enough away that Tommy can only scratch at his arms as he tries to break free.

That’s when the gunshot goes off. For a second, all Tommy knows is that he can breathe freely, that his father’s grip on him has loosened.

Then there’s another shot, and Malcolm falls.

Felicity’s standing, gun in her hands, and staring at Tommy. On the floor, Malcolm is cursing in every language he knows. Blood pools around his legs.

She shot him in the thigh, then the _kneecap._

Tommy almost admires the brutality of it, except Felicity’s face is white as a sheet of paper.

“Bitch,” Malcolm calls her, trying to get himself away from her by using his upper body strength to drag himself away.

“Felicity,” Tommy says, his voice impartial. “Give me the gun.”

She doesn’t even hesitate. She doesn’t look away. She just hands over the gun and watches as Tommy looms over his father. Words are coming out of Malcolm’s mouth, but they’re drowned out by the rush of white noise in Tommy’s head, his own heartbeat loud in his ears.

“Do it,” Felicity whispers.

Thea’s crying in his arms, and Oliver’s second casket is being lowered into the ground. Oliver’s hugging him goodbye and Felicity is crying because Sara just brought home a bloody sword. His sister is traumatised and his best friend is dead and Felicity is a widow.

The Glades have been reduced to rubble. Tommy is twelve years old and not coming out of his room because his whole body hurts. His mother is an angel, and his father is _gone_.

Malcolm spits at him, and sudden clarity washes over Tommy, bringing with it resolve and calm.

“You wouldn’t dare,” Malcolm says. “I’m your—”

Tommy pulls the trigger.

“You’re nothing,” he says.

 

The second month after Oliver’s death, Tommy starts going out into the field dressed in black.

Felicity is slightly relieved not to see Oliver’s green ghost every night, but still she protests. “The people associate black with the Dark Archer, Tommy.”

He flinches at her words, but draws the hood up over his face anyway. “And now they’ll associate it with _me_. I’m not wearing green anymore, Felicity.” He goes back to using his crossbow a week after that. She doesn’t comment on that change. He was always more accurate with it than he was with Oliver’s bow.

They hang up the suit a few days later, putting it in one of the glass display cases, this time for good. At the bottom, Diggle fashions a plaque that reads: _We remember_.

They do. All of them. And as long as the Arrowcave stays open, as long as there are people inside who are willing to put on a mask to find justice that no one else can, Felicity knows no one will ever forget.

“He left a legacy,” Sara tells her as they work on Felicity’s footwork one morning. “I know that in a lot of ways, that was the most Oliver felt he could ask for.”

Ra’s may have sent her back to Starling, but Sara only spends half of her time there. Felicity has a feeling that whenever Nyssa leaves Nanda Parbat, the two women meet up. Once or twice, Felicity does some technical reconnaissance for them. It helps keep her busy, and keeping busy helps.

A week later—and why do these things seem to happen weekly?—Vertigo hits the streets again, and soon the team is tasked with tracking down Count number three. Tommy gets hit with a heavy dose, and Felicity spends twelve exhausting hours trying to help him detox. It’s a brutally painful batch. Later, Tommy tells her that he’s done his share of drugs, and never had a trip that bad.

Once he’s lucid again, they sit side-by-side on the metal table while Tommy sips at a green concoction Thea whipped up for him before she and Roy took off. Diggle’s home changing diapers, and Laurel’s at the station making sure the charges against the new Count stick.

Felicity knows from the words coming out of his mouth while he was high that he saw both of his parents, that Malcolm made him scream and curl into a ball, and Rebecca made him cry and beg to go with her.

Keeping her hand gently pressed to his forearm, Felicity listens when he starts to talk. She knew going in that willfully killing Malcolm was something they couldn’t come back from, but she also knew it was necessary. Her nightmares are still confined to Oliver’s death, not Malcolm’s execution.

But Malcolm wasn’t her father, he was Tommy’s. For better or worse.

And Tommy’s the one who pulled the trigger.

“Was that—” Felicity swallows. “Was seeing Malcolm… was that _new_?”

He shakes his head. Grimacing as he takes another sip of the drink, Tommy sets it back down beside him and says, “No, it’s—it’s been happening since…”

Felicity looks down. “I’m sorry. I should have… should I have done it for you?”

Immediately, he shakes his head. “I don’t think so. I didn’t want you to have to do that.”

“I’d do worse,” Felicity says, and her tone doesn’t do much to hide the fierceness behind it. For him—for Oliver, Thea, Laurel, Sara, Roy, Dig—for her family, she’d do much, much worse. It should terrify her. It doesn’t.

The lair is cold tonight, so she’s wearing Oliver’s grey sweater, the hooded zip-up one that she hasn’t washed because it still smells like him. She tugs at the sleeves, pulling them over her knuckles.

“I know,” Tommy says. He still looks rattled, shaky. Felicity’s never taken Vertigo, but after seeing Oliver and Dig and now Tommy get hit with it, she never ever wants to.

“I’m really glad you’re okay,” she tells him, letting her hand drift down his arm until her fingers are wrapped around his. He gives her hand a squeeze. “You scared me a bit.”

“I scared _me_ ,” he says. “Did Thea...”

“Roy got her out of here before the worst of it.” Felicity doesn’t say that Tommy’s reaction to seeing Thea was alarming at best and terrifying at worst.

“I’ll be better by tonight,” Tommy promises.

“Oh no,” Felicity says, dropping down off of the table and standing in front of him. She’s tiny, but she’d like to see him try to push past her, especially after what Vertigo just put his body and mind through. “No, no, no, you are _not_ going back out in the field tonight. I’m putting my foot down. Being _unconscious_ and being _asleep_ are two different things, and you have been way too much of the former and not enough of the latter. You are going home, and you are going to bed, and one of us will be by later with food and happy movies.”

“Felicity…” his protest sounds weak to her ears, but his _voice_ sounds weak. “You don’t have to.”

“I don’t know that it will be me,” she points out. “I might send Thea if Laurel thinks she’s not ready for the field again. Or if I’m needed here. You really scared her. You scared all of us.”

That’s the thing about death. It puts into perspective how fragile life is, how dangerous what they do is. It’s horrible to think that when one of them leaves the lair, it could be for the last time.

“I’ll go tie you to the bed right now if I have to,” she says, pushing a finger against his chest. He lifts his eyebrows, his lips slowly curving into a grin she hasn’t seen in quite some time.

Felicity blushes, heat creeping along her cheeks, but then from somewhere deep inside her, laughter bubbles up, making her cover her hand with her mouth.

Then he’s laughing too, falling forward a little, letting his forehead rest on her shoulder. She puts her hands on his upper arms and holds onto him as tension and worry drains out of both of them.

“I hate my mouth,” she whines.

“I love your mouth,” Tommy says without hesitation. They stare at each other, and maybe it’s the sleep deprivation, but that sends them into another cascade of laughter.

“C’mon,” she nudges his shoulder. “I’ll drive you home.”

He opens his mouth, like he’s about to say something, but then he changes his mind. “Okay,” he says instead.

Once she gets him home, Felicity _does_ leave him for a few hours. She runs out and picks up some blu-rays from her apartment, and then makes another stop for take-out. When Tommy comes shuffling out of his bedroom a good seven hours after she shoved him inside and told him to sleep, Felicity has made herself comfortable on his couch, laptop on her thighs, feet propped up on his coffee table. She looks up when he enters, taking in his sleep-mussed hair, along with his v-neck undershirt and dark blue pajama pants she’d wager don’t actually get much use.

“Did you sleep?” she asks, and he nods, looking a bit dazed. He sits on the opposite end of the couch, dropping his head into his hands. Felicity sets her laptop aside and stands, stepping around his island counter and heading for the fridge. From the cabinet beside it, she grabs a glass, then fills it from the dispenser on the fridge door. She sets the glass on a coaster near Tommy, and places a sleeve of saltine crackers beside it.

“I brought gatorade too,” she offers. “In case you want it. But I figured you should start with water.”

He’s already downed one third of the glass. “Thank you. You didn’t have to take care of me.”

She can’t help it, she runs her fingers through his hair. It’s a light caress, but he leans into it like he’s as thirsty for the touch as he is for the water. “You needed taking care of.”

Offering her a faint smile, Tommy reaches for the crackers.

“There’s Thai food in the fridge,” Felicity says, “But you should start out slow. And don’t worry, I told them to go easy on the spices in your pad thai.”

He makes an exaggerated face, chewing on a bite of cracker. It’s a point of contention for him that he just cannot handle a lot of spicy food, and she knows it.

“I’ve been wondering about the guitar.” Felicity sits back down on the sofa, gesturing to the six-string acoustic on a stand in the corner.

“I decided I needed a hobby,” Tommy tells her around a bit of cracker. “I’ve had it for a while, actually. Only just now pulled it back out… I got it when I was fifteen. Thought I could do something with it, but…”

Usually when Tommy’s eyes look too full of pain to finish a sentence, he’s thinking about Malcolm, Oliver, or Rebecca. Felicity’s not sure which one to assume here.

“My mom used to play guitar,” he says finally. “Not a lot once the clinic got really busy, but when I was really young, I remember her playing songs to me before bed or to calm me down or just for _fun_.”

Felicity smiles at the thought. “Did she sing too?”

“Like an angel, I think,” Tommy says. “But I can barely remember what her voice sounds like. Malcolm had a recording, from the night she died, but that’s not how I wanted to remember her voice. I think I hear it in my dreams sometimes.”

“So can you play?” Felicity asks, her eyes back on the guitar because it’s easier to look at than Tommy.

“I can strum. And sometimes I can put my fingers on the right strings for easy chords.” He clears his throat. “That’s not hers.” He answers the question before Felicity can ask it. “I’m not sure what happened to hers.”

Malcolm probably got rid of it, Felicity thinks, but she doesn’t say anything to Tommy about it. She suspects he knows. “Will you play something for me?”

“I’m not very good,” he warns, but he moves to the instrument anyway, taking it carefully in his hands and sitting back down.

He’s not. It almost doesn’t matter. He strums a little and hums a little, and Felicity feels lighter than she has in months. The clouds clear over her for a moment, and for just a few seconds, everything seems like it’s going to be okay.

He messes up horribly then, playing some combination of notes with so much dissonance that Felicity winces and quietly says, “Yikes.”

“I told you,” he says, almost bashfully. With great care, he leans the guitar against the coffee table. Twisting, he reaches behind him for one of his throw pillows, and he tosses it in her direction while she shrieks and puts up her hands to stop the assault. Once she’s caught it, she launches herself forward, onto her knees beside him, one hand fisted around a corner of the pillow as she beats him with it mercilessly.

His hands find the soft spaces right beneath her ribs, right on her waist. Felicity lets out a yelp as he goes right for her ticklish spots. The pillow falls to the floor, and Felicity wraps her fingers around Tommy’s wrists, pulling them away from her sides.

He allows her to pin him down, bending his elbows so she can push his wrists against the back of the couch cushions. It doesn’t really register for Felicity that she’s practically climbed onto his lap until suddenly their laughter is fading into soft pants, and his face is close to hers, his pupils blown wide like he’s still got Vertigo in his veins.

She moves back slowly, alarmed by the sudden racing of her heart. Tommy reaches for his water, turning his face away from her. Picking up the pillow and wrapping her arms around it, like it can protect her from the jumble of feelings she doesn’t want to be process, Felicity falls back onto the couch. “Should we watch something?” she asks softly. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Tommy nod.

They sort through Felicity’s movies, bickering casually about their choices. Finally, once they’ve narrowed it down to three, Felicity heads for Tommy’s kitchen. She heats up two servings of pad thai while Tommy chooses a film.

It’s an action comedy, which seems perfect to her. They eat rice noodles with beef and bean sprouts for a while, quiet while the movie plays except for a few chuckles when a joke works well. Tommy seems better with every moment that passes, and Felicity’s struck for a moment by how similar and yet how different he and Oliver are after something like this. Oliver wouldn’t be able to settle down, wouldn’t be comforted by food and movies. He’d need to move, to engage. Before he was with Felicity, that would mean the Salmon Ladder or extra patrols.

After they started dating, it turned to other, incredibly pleasant things that also involved Oliver not wearing a shirt. It was a different sort of connection to reality, but it was an understandable transference.

But Tommy doesn’t want to move. He wants to sit and be distracted, eat his pad thai and…

Felicity’s legs are stretched out on the sofa. If she pointed her toes, she could touch his thigh. His left hand has been resting on her ankles since she sat back down.

Tommy wants connection too, naturally.

Felicity doesn’t consider herself particularly maternal, but she’s definitely protective. She knew how to protect Oliver from his self-doubt and his anxiety. She knows how to protect Tommy from the same things now.

Reaching over to set her empty plate on the coffee table, Felicity snuggles down into the cushions of the couch, bending her knees so that her head can settle on the armrest. Her eyelids feel heavy. Tommy may have slept, but she’s going on… her brain is too tired to do the math.

The movie blurs. When she opens her eyes, the TV is off, the room is dark, and Tommy’s gone.

There’s a soft blanket covering her body, tucked gently around her shoulders. It smells like Tommy’s aftershave, and Felicity breathes deeply, soothed by the familiarity. A dim light illuminates the kitchen, and Felicity can see Tommy sitting at the counter, drinking something out of a mug and staring at a piece of paper in his hand.

Standing quietly, Felicity wraps the blanket around her shoulders and walks over to him.

It’s a photo. The four of them—Felicity, Oliver, Thea, and Tommy—at the wedding. It’s her family. It’s _Tommy’s_ family.

Tommy doesn’t look at her when she approaches. Felicity lets her hands hover over his shoulders, then gives in and sets them down. Tommy doesn’t flinch. She’s not sure if she should have expected him to.

“He was happy,” Tommy says. “You gave him that.”

“So did you,” she reminds him. “So did _he_. He found happiness. He worked hard for it. He let it in when it approached him. He wrote his own happy story. He chose it.”

Tommy looks up at her. His eyes are sad and thoughtful.

“Maybe,” Felicity says, covering his hand with hers, “It’s our turn to make a choice.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kind of a shorter chapter, but the next update, which will be on June 30th, will be nice and long.


	11. PART TWO: CHAPTER ELEVEN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life goes on; Tommy and Felicity's relationship begins to change.

One Sunday afternoon, Tommy carefully packs the trunk of his car and drives to Felicity’s apartment. Butterflies leap in his stomach as he walks down the hallway to her front door.

Felicity answers her door on the second knock, a paper cup of Jefferson’s coffee in one hand and one-half of an everything bagel held between her teeth. She’s dressed in a fluffy purple robe that’s covered in pink and yellow cupcakes. There are fuzzy bunny slippers on her feet.

“Morning,” she says around a mouth of bagel, so the word sounds almost unintelligible. “C’mon inside.”

As soon as he looks at her, Tommy realizes that he didn’t call or text, he just showed up at her apartment. Instantly, he feels foolish. If Oliver were here, it wouldn’t be a problem—

But he lets that thought be. Oliver isn’t here. And Felicity’s standing in the open doorway with her eyebrows raised, likely wondering why he’s still standing in the hallway like an idiot.

Words start falling out of his mouth a little _too_ quickly. “Starling City Orchestra is playing a selection of movie music in the park this afternoon. Thought you might want to come.” A little sheepishly, he raises the wicker basket in his hand. “I made us a picnic.”

His heart only has a few seconds to pound in his chest, because excitement flashes across her face as she pulls the bagel free of her mouth. “Did you bring wine?”

Tommy holds up the bottle in his other hand, and he grins when he sees her eyes light up at the words on the label. “You are a good person, Tommy Merlyn.”

The words cause a warm, pleasant feeling to spread through his chest.

He’s about to suggest that they go, when Felicity turns her head to look back at her living room, at what Tommy is sure symbolizes all the things she was planning to do today.

“Take a _break_ , Felicity,” he says, trying to sound encouraging, rather than worried. “It’ll all be here when you get back.”

She sighs. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

But then she’s running off to get dressed and Tommy’s breathing a sigh of relief.

When they get to the park, the two of them divide their picnic equipment in half and stroll along a stone path through the trees until they get to the area in front of where the musicians are setting up. They’re early, so they could get a really good spot, but they opt for hanging back a little bit, choosing privacy.

Felicity spreads out the blanket on the grass and kneels down. Tommy sits on the opposite side, keeping a good distance between them. She deserves a day out. She deserves to feel treated and special.

She doesn’t deserve to have to even entertain the _thought_ that her deceased husband's best friend is putting the moves on her, especially since that’s not what Tommy is doing at all.

“So,” Felicity says, leaning back with a red solo cup of wine in her hand, “Not that I’m not appreciative— because I _am_ —but to what do I owe this little field trip?”

Tommy shrugs, “I’ve just… been watching you burn the candle at both ends for such a long time watching over everybody else. I was worried about you. Thought you could use a break. I know I needed one.”

She nods, sipping her wine. “You’re always focused on what everybody else needs—Thea, me, Laurel, all of us—that I have to wonder where you’re getting what you need.”

“I just need you all to be okay,” he says.

Felicity studies him, her head tilted just slightly to one side. “I don’t entirely think that’s true.”

It’s probably not, but Tommy’s not accustomed to letting other people _see_ that, and he turns back to the picnic basket so Felicity won’t.

He hasn’t had anybody looking out for what _he_ needed since his mother died. He needed _her_ , but she was gone. He needed a father to love him and support him and to be _there_ , and his father was gone. What Tommy needed, he was incapable of ever having, whether through his mother’s death or his father’s cruelty. As much as Robert and Moira were present in Tommy’s life, he was not _theirs_. They were accommodating, but not entirely accepting. He was tolerated, for Oliver’s sake, but never _included_. Not in the way his heart ached to be.

Then there was Oliver, Oliver who was practically his family. His touchstone. But then Oliver was gone, washed away, and there was—

There was _Thea_. Thea needed things from him, though most of the time she claimed not to want them.

Now… now he’s right back into the same pattern. Take care of everyone else, make sure they have what they need, his own needs forgotten. Unimportant.

Tommy’s lived as unimportant. Unimportant to Malcolm after Rebecca’s death. Unimportant to the Queens after Oliver was lost.

His hands shake, just slightly, as he pulls wrapped sandwiches out of the basket and sets them between himself and Felicity. “Even if I did need something,” he tells her, “I couldn’t even begin to tell you what it is.”

He turns back to the basket, pulling out fruit and potato chips—sour cream and onion, Felicity’s favorite—to add to the spread in front of them.

“You really went all out,” Felicity says, when he sets out a few varieties of cheese and crackers to go with the wine.

“It’s worth it,” Tommy says, careful not to misspeak and say _you’re_.

Her gaze meets his, and the moment changes. Tommy swallows, the sudden intensity of her eyes on him making the back of his neck uncomfortably hot. Not seeming to notice, Felicity reaches for a package of cheese and unwraps it. Tommy has the presence of mind to pass her a small knife and cutting board, taking care that their fingers don’t touch.

When the music starts, they grow silent, listening. Tommy sits up and watches the musicians for a little while, but after a few songs, he settles back against the blanket, crossing his legs at the ankles and tucking his hands beneath his head. Felicity stays upright, her legs folded beneath her.

He can tell the moment the wine kicks in, the moment Felicity’s shoulders release their tension and she lets herself relax. She’s carried a lot lately, the loss of her husband, the need to protect her city.

The night before, he stood behind her at her workstation, pressing his palms to her shoulders and rubbing, watching as she tipped her head forward and sighed as his hands worked tired muscles. That was the moment that gave him the encouragement to do this, give Felicity this moment of beauty and serenity.

The music flows around them, and neither of them speaks. A light breeze blows through the trees, and though it’s not really cold, Tommy passes Felicity his jacket when he sees her she shiver ever so slightly.

Eventually, Felicity leans back, an elbow braced against the ground to prop her head up so she can watch the conductor. He’s an animated fellow, bobbing up and down with the music, and Tommy’s enjoyed watching him—when he’s had the presence of mind to tear his eyes off of Felicity and focus on the reason they’re there.

But the sweetness of the music only serves to make this time with Felicity _more_ beautiful, more magical. It stirs a longing inside him that his own personal experience tells him is dangerous.

At the end of the concert, they pack up their things in silence. It takes no words for them each to agree to fold the blanket together. Tommy takes two corners, and Felicity takes the opposite two. They step towards each other steadily as they raise the ends to meet again and again. On the last fold, Felicity’s fingers freeze as he takes the cloth from her, and the tips of her fingers brush against his knuckles lightly.

Tommy sucks in a quick breath. He wasn’t expecting _that_.

From her open mouth and wide eyes, neither was she. His heart pumps faster, excitement spinning through his gut at the thought of letting the blanket fall to the grass in favor of kissing her, just once.

Helpless to stop himself, he sways towards her. She tips her chin up, eyelids heavier by the moment. It’s powerful, the desire that courses through him, and the only thing that stops him from following it with all his heart is a glint of something shiny that catches his eye. The glimmer is on his right, Felicity’s left, and it’s from the diamond ring on her fourth finger.

The moment breaks.

It crumbles slowly, first by the way Tommy leans back, pulling the blanket with him, and then by the way Felicity turns away, reaching down for the basket she’s just re-packed.

“Thank you,” Felicity says as she straightens. She motions to the musicians putting away their instruments. “For reminding me what we’re protecting.”

That makes him smile. He’s watched the late nights in the cave, seen the exhaustion in her eyes. It’s not correct to say that Felicity has become the team’s de facto leader, but she has taken on a considerable amount of responsibility since Oliver’s death. Roy, Thea, Laurel, even Diggle to an extent, they all look to her.

She sits in her chair with her hands on a keyboard, but her very words—her directions to each of her partners—those shape the city. She is the one with the big picture, with the brainpower to put the puzzle pieces together, and it’s a skill she wields with monumental results.

With a bit of playful chivalry, Tommy offers her his arm. He wants to take her hand instead. She loops her arm through his, keeping the touch casual, and they walk back to Tommy’s car.

After they’ve stopped at her apartment door, she reaches for him, and he doesn’t back away. Her hug is easy, like Oliver’s was. Tommy sinks into it. His eyes close. One of her hands cups the back of his neck, sliding gently up into his hair, and for a moment, just a moment, Tommy longs to break apart in her arms again, they way he did after Oliver’s funeral.

He feels so safe here, and he wants to stay. Incredibly, Felicity doesn’t let go. She runs a hand down his spine and he finds himself shaking in her arms, overwhelmed by the comfort of it, by how _badly_ he wants to be comforted by her. He aches with the knowledge that he doesn’t deserve it, doesn’t dare ask for it. She’s been through enough, she doesn’t deserve to be asked to help shoulder this burden as well.

“It’s okay,” Felicity says. “You’re okay.”

When he loosens his arms around her, letting her back away, though he doesn’t move, she looks up at him through wet eyelashes.

“Come inside for coffee?” she asks, and he wants to. The night is still young—it’s barely seven.

And he doesn’t want to be alone. He suspects she doesn’t either.

Naturally, the coffee is a pretense. He doesn’t drink any, and while Felicity fixes hers up the way she likes it, he only sees her lift her mug to her lips once or twice.

They stand on opposite sides of the kitchen island, each leaning forward as they talk, but keeping the barrier between them. For a while, they talk about the concert, about the different pieces that were played. It only took hearing the first few notes of the _Star Wars_ theme for Felicity to break into a glorious smile the likes of which Tommy hasn’t seen since Oliver left them.

When the conversation turns serious, it does so in an instant. One moment Felicity’s laugh is dying down, there’s a light and mirth in her eyes that shines brightly in Tommy’s direction, and the next she’s pinching her lips together, as if there’s a thought in her head she’s trying to either let out or keep in.

Ducking his head in a refusal to acknowledge the piercing way she’s looking at him, Tommy’s caught off guard when she reaches across the counter and lets her fingers close around his wrist. He jerks his head up. “I worry about you,” she says.

“I’m alright,” he lies.

If it’s possible, her expression grows even more serious. “That’s why I’m worried.”

“You don’t have to worry about me.” Tommy lowers his eyes to his coffee. He contemplates raising the cup to his lips for a drink, to offset the sudden tension inside him, but it _is_ lukewarm. It would taste flavorless anyway, not because Felicity doesn’t make damn good cups of coffee, but because his stomach is rolling and his mouth feels like he’s been sucking on chalk.

“I worry about all of you. Just like you do.” She takes a deep breath. “We said— _you_ said—that we couldn’t do this alone. That we had to do it together.”

He nods, sharply. He fights the impulse to pull his hand away from hers.

“So,” she says. “Let me in.”

With a huge, terrible sigh, Tommy stops fighting to look okay. His forehead presses against the back of her hand.

He doesn’t know how to tell her a lot of things. He doesn’t know how to tell her that his eyes won’t look at her right. They won’t look at her and see his best friend’s wife. They look at her and see a _woman_. A beautiful one. Beautiful and smart and intelligent. His hands don’t want to stay on the platonic places he sets them. He wants things he shouldn’t want. Not now. Not… not _yet_.

But there are other things he can tell her. He can tell her how much he wanted to go in Oliver’s stead. He can tell her how every day he reaches for his phone to call Oliver and realizes he can’t. Again. How in his dreams, he can’t remember if Oliver is dead or alive. He wakes up confused, not sure if it’s 2010 or 2014. Is Oliver here or gone?

Felicity listens, and somehow, that’s all Tommy needs. Her fingers soothe a path up and down his forearm. The comfort of the touch encourages him to keep going.

By the time he’s run out of words, he’s exhausted. By this point, they’ve moved to the couch, him beside her, with very little space between them.

He thinks about how he came here for _her_ ,  to help _her_ , and she helped him instead. It was more than he could have thought to ask for.

Tommy falls asleep wrapped in Felicity’s arms, feeling—for the first time in quite a long while—safe.

* * *

Life gets better slowly. Even without the Arrow’s presence in Starling, the evidence of others willing to fight for Starling keeps the city’s morale high. Felicity divides her time between her work in Queen Consolidated’s Research and Development department and her late hours at the Arrowcave.

The cave expands. After a week-long trip to Central City, Laurel comes back with her own mask, courtesy of Cisco. Felicity hasn’t seen Barry since Oliver’s funeral, and in a way she’s almost jealous that Laurel gets to make the trip. Between time off on her hunt for Malcolm and time off after Oliver’s death, Felicity’s tied to her work for a little while. Any vacation days she has have to be saved for emergencies.

Beyond that, several other events conspire against her ability to leave Starling City. Delilah Diggle has a perfectly good nanny who comes down with bronchitis a week before Lyla and Diggle’s second wedding. Felicity spends a few nights using the office at her apartment and rocking the little one on her shoulder while coordinating city-wide patrols.

On one of the quieter nights, Tommy drops by, letting Roy, Thea and Laurel take care of the city. There’s a burglar that needs chasing, but no “Big Bad” villains this week. No creepy serial killers or masked renegades killing or threatening people.

Yet.

It’s Dig and Lyla’s wedding weekend, so Felicity hopes there won’t be _any_. Tommy has a key, and he texted her when he arrived at her building, so she doesn’t freak out when she hears the door opening. Nevertheless, Tommy’s quick “It’s me!” causes her to draw her hand back from the gun strapped beneath her desk.

“Did you bring food?” she says softly, aware that little Delilah’s ears are only a few inches from her mouth. The little girl is currently fascinated by a multi-colored set of plastic car keys. The purple one is in her mouth.

Tommy grins. “I made lasagna. Your oven is preheating.”

Suddenly aware of Tommy’s presence, Dee stretches out her arms for him, wiggling her little fingers into fists. Tommy lifts her up out of Felicity’s arms, rubbing his nose against hers. The plastic keys fall to the floor, forgotten.

She grins at him, one of those wide, baby grins, as Tommy cradles her against his chest and bends to give Felicity a quick peck on the cheek. The _beep_ coming from the kitchen tells Felicity her oven has preheated. “I’ll go throw the lasagna in,” he says. “You keep saving the city.”

Felicity doesn’t bother to tell him that the city is mostly saved. The night has been rather quiet, and she’s about ready to leave her computer to run its various searches and Thea and Roy to do… whatever it is they do with their free time. Felicity’s not going to think too much about that.

Her laptop is keyed in to all of the important alerts, so Felicity carries it into the living room and leaves it on one of her end tables—the high one, in the corner, where the six-month-old will not _quite_ be reaching just yet. Delilah isn’t quite walking yet. She can sort of stand and balance; she can sit up; and she can do this adorable little army crawl that isn’t exactly the real thing.

“About forty minutes,” Tommy says. One of Delilah’s palms is pressed to his cheeks while she babbles at him. With her other hand, she tugs at his earlobe.

Kicking off her shoes Felicity settles down on the couch, watching as Tommy turns Dee into an airplane and zooms her around the room, letting her come in for a landing on Felicity’s stomach. Head propped up on the armrest and her knees bent, Felicity lets the little girl explore the buttons on her shirt and the beaded bracelet she’s wearing.

The last time Felicity babysat, Delilah had been distracted by the ring on her left hand, but that’s not there to distract her anymore. It’s in a ring dish on her dresser. Close and cherished, but not ever-present.

Tommy sits on the floor in front of her with his legs stretched out. Leaning his left side into the couch, he lets his left hand rests against her calf as he holds his right out to stop Dee from twisting off of Felicity. “Careful, kiddo,” he says. “She’s gonna be moving faster than Barry soon.”

“That would be impressive,” Felicity says, distracted by looping her index finger around one of Dee’s curls. The little girl turns her head and tries to nibble at her thumb.

Delilah wiggles, turning over sharply in such a way that she almost rolls over the edge. They both reach for her at once, hands on her back to prevent her fall. Giggling, Dee settles again when Tommy passes her a stuffed panda.

Felicity doesn’t really pay attention to the fact that her left hand is still resting over Tommy’s right until he turns his hand over so their palms meet. His thumb runs over the top of her ring finger, skimming over her knuckle.

Neither of them say a word for a long moment.

He had to have… he had to have noticed before just now, Felicity thinks. But maybe not. She doesn’t want to say anything. There’s nothing _to_ say.

Delilah chews on her panda’s ear.

“We should feed her,” Felicity says softly.

“In a minute,” Tommy says. Felicity doesn’t press him.

“Okay.” She shifts a little, trying to keep the baby from squirming away again. He keeps her hand in his.

“She’s got a great smile,” Felicity says, for lack of anything else to say. Dee switches from the bear’s left ear to his right. One of her little hands is wrapped around the stuffed animal’s arm, but the other is holding onto Tommy’s thumb.

“She does,” he says, automatically, like his mind is elsewhere. Felicity doesn’t bother trying to start a conversation after that.

When Dee’s wriggling turns from playful to fussy, Tommy carries her off to change her while Felicity stumbles through setting up the girl’s portable high-chair and digging through one of the bags Lyla sent for her dinner. By the time she’s located the two containers, one of pumpkin, one of peas, Tommy’s back with Dee.

Felicity takes the pumpkin and Tommy takes the peas. Together they manage to get most of the orange and green mush into Dee’s mouth. There’s a truly impressive moment where Dee knocks the spoon from Tommy’s hand. It lands on her tray, she whacks it again with her fist so it flies up and hits Tommy in the nose.

Felicity laughs so hard she almost falls out of her chair. Dee claps her hands and gives Tommy little gleeful babbles while he wipes pumpkin off of his face. Once she’s stopped laughing so hard, Felicity passes him a wet wipe for his orange nose.

“You make it look good,” she tells him with mock consolation.

“Let’s see how you like it.” He threateningly waves a spoonful at her, and she shrieks, ducking behind Dee’s chair. “You wouldn’t fling baby food at the _baby_ ,” she protests.

“Don’t underestimate my ability to aim,” he teases.

The timer on the oven dings. “Better hold that thought,” Felicity says. “The grown-up food is done.”

Reluctantly, Tommy sets the spoon down. He heads for the oven while Felicity cleans up Dee. After changing her into her pajamas, Felicity puts the little girl in her playpen. While Delilah dozes, Felicity pours two glasses of wine. Tommy brings two plates of lasagna and sets them down on the coffee table.

“This is _amazing_ ,” Felicity tells him, two bites in. It’s pretty damn perfect, the right combination of cheeses and sauce and spices and flavors bursting on her tongue. “You’re amazing.”

“Thank you,” Tommy says with a grin. “You… pick out really good wine.”

Felicity raises her glass. “Damn right I do.”

There’s a _clink_ when their glasses meet between them. The wine settles her, makes the world feel softer around its edges. They eat quietly while Tommy sifts through her Netflix queue.

“Oooh,” Felicity says, pointing. “That one.”

“That one?” he checks.

She grins. “Yeah. That one. You’ll like that one.”

He presses the button to start the movie. Snuggling back into the couch cushions, Felicity scoots a little closer to him. Their shoulders touch. She tries not to overthink it.

Fifteen minutes into the movie, Felicity sets her empty plate aside. When she settles back against Tommy’s side, tucking her legs into the couch cushion beside her, he wraps his arm around her shoulders. She tries not to overthink that either. It’s nice, having someone hold her like this. Even while the couple on screen bickers about something insignificant, having Tommy solid and warm beside her makes her feel fuzzy in the best way.

In a way she hasn’t felt in a long time.

When Tommy rises to take away the empty plates, Felicity watches him go. She checks on Dee, who is totally asleep, despite the sound of the TV. Tommy slips back into the room and passes her a bowl of mint chip. Wriggling on the couch, Felicity draws her legs up to her chest, balancing the bowl on her knees. Regardless of the cold ice cream, Felicity feels a warmth in her chest, a peace that comes from both knowing and being known.

Another thing she shouldn’t be overthinking.

Lyla and Dig arrive thirty minutes before the movie will end. Tommy hits the pause button. Like a magician, Lyla gets Dee into her car seat without waking her up. Diggle and Tommy wrestle the playpen into submission while Felicity gives Lyla the babysitting mission report.

This is the part of the evening where Tommy could go home. He could file out after Diggle and Lyla and it wouldn’t be strange.

But he doesn’t. He rinses the ice cream bowls and hangs around until after Dig and Lyla leave. Felicity debates letting him off the hook, telling him that they can finish up later if he wants.

Before she can, he shuts the dishwasher and asks, “Should we finish the movie?”

Felicity nods. “Sure.”

She sits on the other side of the couch and presses a throw pillow to her chest. The movie plays on, the music swelling as the romantic couple stands staring at each other. They’re on a beach, bathed in the light from a sunset.

Felicity bites her lip as they run to each other. It’s a funny movie, and that’s why she enjoys it, but she neglected to remember how the ending always makes her a bit emotional. She digs her fingernails into the pillow.

Reaching over, Tommy covers her wrist with his hand. “You okay?”

She nods and turns her hand over so she can lace her fingers through his. It frightens her, the way she doesn’t want to let go, doesn’t want _him_ to go, wants him to put his arm around her again.

The couple on-screen kisses. The credits begin to roll.

Felicity looks at Tommy. He’s already staring at her. She wonders how long she’s been the subject of his gaze and instead of the movie.

“Felicity,” he says softly.

She can’t move. She wants to run, to pull away. She doesn’t want to feel what she’s feeling.

But at the same time she wants to feel it more. She wants it to get stronger. Felicity puts her other hand on Tommy’s shoulder, rubbing her thumb across his collarbone.

He says her name again, moving closer. She licks her lips, wondering, waiting. Holding her breath. Tommy’s hand cups the underside of her jaw. His thumb brushes against her skin.

There’s no point in lying to herself by denying that she’s thought about kissing Tommy. She has. More than she’d like to admit, since that moment in the park.

Imagination has nothing on the real thing. His hands are warm against her skin, and his lips are soft as they move against hers. One of his hands insistently presses firmly to the small of her back, and she pushes herself forward, getting closer to him.

She tilts her head into the kiss, wanting, encouraging—

There’s a knock at her door.

They don’t jump apart, but they do freeze.

Slowly, Felicity backs away. Tommy stays sitting while she walks to the door, one hand pressed lightly over her mouth. She peeks through the peephole and then unlocks the door to let Diggle inside.

“Patsy the Panda is here,” Diggle says. Felicity turns back to Tommy. The aforementioned Patsy is halfway under the coffee table at his feet. Tommy pulls her out and tosses her to Dig, who catches it with one hand. “Thanks, man,” Diggle says.

“Anytime,” Tommy says. “I’d hate for Dee to be forced to spend a night without Patsy.”

Felicity pretends not to hear Diggle’s groan. Dee is ridiculously attached to that fuzzball. Diggle uses the bear to give them a salute as he heads out. Felicity starts to shut the door, but then realizes that Tommy is standing right behind her. His hands are in his pockets. He’s fidgeting.

“You headed home?” Felicity asks, trying to talk around the sudden dryness in her throat.

“I should, yeah.” He doesn’t look like he wants to, and she suspects she doesn’t look like she wants him to either. Felicity steps forward at the same time he reaches to hug her. She sighs into the embrace.

He presses a kiss to her cheek. After she closes the door behind him, Felicity’s apartment feels very large and very quiet.

She stares at the nakedness of her left ring finger, blinking back a sudden rush of tears.

What is she _thinking_? What is she _doing_? Why does it feel horrible and wonderful all at once?

In the stillness, Felicity falls back against her front door and touches trembling fingers to her lips.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a feeling that the July 4th holiday and that fact that I'm traveling next weekend may work against me, so there will probably not be an update on July 7th. Expect one on July 14th.


	12. PART TWO: CHAPTER TWELVE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A huge step forward means Tommy and Felicity suddenly have one more change to cope with.

On the day Diggle and Lyla get married, Felicity puts on a dress and make-up and curls her hair, pinning it so it drapes over her right shoulder. Tommy shows up at her apartment door fifteen minutes early. She lets him inside while she’s putting in her earrings.

“You gonna be okay today?” he asks, waiting until both earrings are in place before he takes both of her hands to help her step into her shoes. She leans on him for balance without even thinking about it.

“I’m going to think about him,” she says, wiggling on one shoe, then the other. “There’s no way not to. It’s a wedding. It’s _Dig’s_ wedding. We were supposed to drink champagne and dance and I wasn’t supposed to have to worry about going up when they throw the bouquet.”

“No one is going to judge you if you don’t go up when they throw the bouquet.” He holds out her jacket so she can slide her arms in. “And I’ll dance with you. Probably won’t step on your toes as much either.”

She almost smiles. “Oliver was always so much more graceful when he was, well, arrow-ing people.”

He _does_ smile at her. It’s a sad smile, but it’s a smile, and she can’t help but smile back. It feels good to smile about Oliver.

They do dance that night. They start with a happy song (“Saturday night and we in the spot. Don’t believe me just watch.”) and they end up holding onto each other while Frank Sinatra sings (“It had to be you, wonderful you, it had to be you.”).

True to his word, Tommy doesn’t step on her toes. By the last dance, she lets her head rest on his shoulder as they stand and sway.

They share a cab back to Felicity’s apartment, and Tommy takes her arm as he helps her up the stairs. She’s a little wobbly, from the combination of champagne and high heels.

She’s the one who leans up to kiss him. It was a lovely night, a beautiful wedding, a wonderful dance.

And she wants to kiss him.

His eyes close. He wets his lips with his tongue, but just before their lips touch, he stops her.

“You’re drunk.” His hands are on her cheeks; his breath is hot against her mouth.

She just barely shakes her head. She barely had a full glass of champagne. “I’m not drunk.”

“Felicity,” he says, and he says her name differently than Oliver. Different than how she’s ever really heard it. Low and anguished.

They stand there, close but unmoving.

Tentatively, Felicity puts her hands on his chest. She closes her eyes in defeat, waits for him to move away.

He doesn’t. Instead, he lets his lips brush over hers once.

Twice.

One of his hands falls from her face and presses against the small of her back. He still hasn’t quite kissed her properly, but she doesn’t have to wait long. The third time his lips touch hers it’s a _real_ kiss, and she’s surprised enough that she gasps into it.

It’s wild. Thrilling in a way that makes her curl her toes and press her thighs together with want.

The zipper of her dress is beneath her left arm, and she fumbles with it, pulling her hand away when Tommy takes over for her.

“Are you—” His breath is harsh against her mouth, his voice rough. Felicity lightly bites his lip and whatever he was about to say gets lost.

They don’t make it to a bed. Felicity’s almost relieved about that. He walks her backward, down the hall and into the living room. She sinks into the couch cushions, looking up at Tommy as he bends to kiss her. The position is awkward, it puts an uncomfortable strain on her neck, but the kiss only lasts a few moments before Tommy moves to kneel between her legs.

She shivers, arousal spiking through her as Tommy pushes up her skirt. His eyes don’t leave hers. Scooting forward, Felicity lifts her arms to encourage him to take the dress off. For a second, he hesitates, but then he follows through on the action, gently pulling it up and over her head.

“Can I take your hairpins out?” Tommy asks. He sets her dress on the armchair beside the couch and cups the back of her head with his hand.

She nods, pulling at his tie. He removes the pins carefully, making sure not to pull her hair or hurt her. While he works, he lavishes soft, slow kisses on her neck and collarbone. Felicity tips her head to give him the opportunity to kiss even more of her neck.

Tommy uses the most incredible care as he builds her up. Every touch is exquisite. He’s very intentional with how he touches her, where he kisses her, when he moves his focus from one part of her body to another.  

Felicity grips his hair firmly as Tommy buries his head between her thighs and works her until she screams and shakes and sobs. When she pushes his head away, he kisses his way back up her body, and she drags his mouth back up to hers while she accidentally tears buttons off of his shirt.

For a while it’s fast and frantic and Felicity sort of gets lost in it. Then she’s lying on her back, and Tommy’s weight is perfect over her, and everything slows.

Overwhelmed, she whimpers when he slides inside her. She keeps her gaze locked with his when he starts to move. He presses his forehead to hers, pulling her body even closer to his. She digs her nails into his skin and delights in the sounds he makes when he gets close, the way his rhythm falters and the strangled way he says her name.

After, she takes his hand and drags him into her shower. They fall asleep on the bed a little while later, wrapped around each other. Intentionally, Felicity takes Oliver’s side of the bed.

She wakes up the next morning, and in the haze between sleep and wakefulness her brain tricks her into seeing Oliver in bed beside her for just a moment. Startled, she rolls onto her back, scrunching her eyes shut. The palm of Tommy’s hand is warm against her stomach, and she focuses on the sensation.

The mattress shifts at the same time Tommy does. She feels his light stubble against the side of her neck, then the press of his lips against her collarbone. Sighing, Felicity slides her fingers into his hair.

Everything feels different in the daylight. Better.

Tommy tilts his head up to look at her. “Hey,” he says, caressing her cheek.

She leans into the touch. “Hey,” she replies.

He gives scratchy, sleepy kisses against the side of her neck. One of his hands slides under her tank top, up her back.

“Did—did you wanna talk?” Felicity asks. Finding words feels very difficult at the moment. “About this?”

He exhales heavily. The warmth of his breath against her skin makes her squirm and muffle a giggle.

“If you want,” he says, moving to the other side of her neck to place kisses there.

“You make me happy,” she tells him.

He pulls back, looks at her, and for a moment she’s worried she said the wrong thing. He doesn’t look sad or upset though, he looks _touched_. Then he grins. “Good,” he says, and all her worries fly away when he goes back to kissing the underside of her jaw.

He hums, lips against her neck. “I’ve got sunshine,” he sings softly, pulling back to draw her top over her head. “On a cloudy day.”

“When it’s cold outside…” she continues for him, as he palms one of her breasts and kisses the other. “I’ve got the month of…”

A hard suck against the tender skin on the underside of her breast has her losing track of the song and gasping his name.

“May,” she breathes out a second later, while he glances up at her, his expression smug. She tugs on his hair so he brings his attention back to her lips, dropping quick kisses on them in between notes of the song.

“I—” Kiss. “Guess.” Kiss. “You’d—” Kiss. “Say.”

A long kiss. Felicity rocks her hips up into his.

“What can make me,” he stops. He kisses her again, slowly. She practically melts in his arms. His tongue is magic. His weight is solid and heavy over her, and it’s lovely feeling this close to another person again.

He can’t seem to get out another note. With his lips right against hers, he whispers, “Feel this way.”

She kisses him before he can say the next two words. She’s not sure how to be his girl. Not yet. She’s not sure that’s even where this is headed.

Because she wasn’t lying. He makes her _happy_ , and that’s not something she thought she’d ever feel again. Not like this. Not like she could fly out of her skin from it. She never thought she’d get this fluttery feeling in her stomach again. Not in this lifetime.

And maybe that’s enough for right now. She runs her hands down his chest, lingering on his abs, loving the way he’s looking at her. She pushes lightly at his shoulder, and he takes the hint, rolling over so she can climb on top of him.

With his hands on her hips, she takes a great deal of pleasure in grinding against him, unable to ignore the thrill that shoots through her when his fingers press harder into her skin.

“You make me happy too,” he tells her, breathless.

Biting her lip, she pulls at the hem of his undershirt, and Tommy obliges by sitting up to take it off. Instead of lying back down, he wraps his arms around her and presses a kiss to her breastbone.

“That’s okay, right?” he asks.

“Yeah,” she whispers, using her hand to tilt his head up so she can look in his eyes. “That’s okay.”

* * *

 

It takes a full week before guilt slams into Tommy’s chest like a freight train. It’s a bit of a miracle it takes that long.

He slips into Felicity’s apartment—he’s had a key for a while now, but he doesn’t always use it—and finds her in the living room surrounded by boxes. She’s got a bandana wrapped around her head, holding back her curls, and she’s wearing one of Oliver’s sweatshirts, with the sleeves rolled up several times.

It’s impossible to mistake what she’s doing. Oliver’s clothes are stacked in piles across the sofa and coffee table.

“Felicity?” Tommy says warily, “what are you doing?”

She starts, looking first at him, then at the clock on the mantle. “Wow. I didn’t think this would take this long. I was supposed to be finished by the time you got here, I just—”

She doesn’t really have to explain more. He can see how puffy her eyes are, the empty tissue box beside the couch, and the wastebasket overflowing with tissues.

“Why are you doing this _now_?” He hopes she doesn’t use him as the reason. There’s no way he’ll be able to handle that.

“It’s been months,” she says, standing up. “He’s gone. He’s not—” Her voice cracks, and Tommy’s heart cracks with it. “He’s not coming back. And _this_ —” she waves her hand at the room around her. “—this place is turning into a tomb. And I didn’t die with him, Tommy. So I’m not going to let myself be buried with him.”

“Felicity…”

“No,” she says firmly. “This is my choice. I’ve made it. Besides. I’m not… not getting _rid_ of anything. I’m hoping that we can just store these in the lair until I’ve figured out what to do with them.”

She glances around, hands on her hips. “The clothes can go to charity, but I don’t think I’m ready to part with some of them yet.” Felicity runs her hands down the arms of the sweater she’s wearing. “Some of these things… some of these things Thea will want. Some of these things _you_ might want.”

He wants _her_.

The realization is a punch in the stomach. There are words caught in his throat. His chest feels tight.

Silently, Tommy turns away and walks into the kitchen. He goes right for the cabinet with the glasses, then moves to the fridge. He can hear Felicity moving around in the other room as he takes slow sips of water.

Felicity clears her throat, and Tommy turns to see her standing in the doorway, arms crossed. “You wanna tell me what you’re thinking?” she asks. “Because I have a theory, but I’d like to know for sure.”

“What’s your theory?”

“That you think you don’t deserve happiness. That I’m technically ‘off-limits’ or some bullshit like that just because I’m the widow of your best friend. That I can’t really care about you. That this is too soon or too fast.” She shrugs her shoulders. “Take your pick.”

“You’re packing up your husband’s clothes,” Tommy can’t help pointing out.

“Which is something I’ve been thinking about for weeks now,” Felicity says. “It has nothing to do with—” She looks down, composes herself, then continues. “It has nothing to do with you.”

“I have done this before, Felicity. It ended…”

They both know how it ended.

“I know what I want.” She steps closer, touches his cheek. “I know this seems fast. Just… trust me, Tommy.”

“I’m trying,” he says. “I _am_ trying, Felicity.”

“I know,” she says. “This is new territory for both of us. And I am _terrified_.”

He presses his forehead against hers. “Me too.”

* * *

 

Tommy hits the mat _hard_ , groaning and rolling away from the younger Lance sister’s quick feet. Sara offers him a hand up. “You wanna tell me what’s been bothering you?”

He breathes out a short, huffy breath. “Felicity.”

“Felicity?” Sara’s eyebrows hit her forehead. “Our Felicity. Felicity Queen?”

He flinches at the use of Felicity’s last name. It’s not a fact that he can forget, but it’s not something he wants thrown in his face either.

Everything about Felicity seems designed to remind him that she’s Oliver’s widow. The empty space on her left hand that used to hold Oliver’s ring, her _name_ , the pictures scattered across her apartment—the apartment that used to be hers and Oliver’s.

_Everything_.

“Tommy,” Sara says warily, “What are you doing?”

He heads for his water bottle and takes a long swig. “I don’t know, Sara.”

She cocks her head to the side and looks at him. Sara looks at people differently since coming back to Starling after her six-year disappearance. She was always perceptive, always intuitive. It’s just a skill she’s honed more effectively. Tommy guesses a lot of that has to do with being in the League for five years, having to judge friend from foe.

“I see a lot, Tommy.”

“I know you do,” he says. She saw Felicity and Oliver from only a few moments of observation.

“I don’t want her hurt,” she tells him. “I don’t want _you_ hurt.”

“I don’t want to hurt her,” he says, sitting down on the edge of the training mat.

“I know,” Sara gracefully sits down beside him. “You don’t want to hurt Oliver, either.”

“Oliver’s dead.”

“Yet another thing I know,” she whispers. Tommy looks away from her. She was Oliver’s second during the duel. She saw Oliver die. She was there for his last moments. Tommy both pities and envies her for that. “He was dead the first time when you were with Laurel. I get the sense that you still feel like you deserve to be punished for that.”

He doesn’t answer. The truth stings. His heart doesn’t seem to want anything Oliver hasn’t touched. It’s a cruel twist of fate.

“He’s gone, Tommy,” Sara whispers. “You don’t know how many times in my life I’ve believed that, but this time I know it to be true. He’s _gone_. We’re still here. We get to keep living.”

“It should have been me this time,” he tells her. “I should have gone, then Thea—Felicity—wouldn’t have lost—”

“Thea would have lost a brother,” Sara says. “Felicity would have lost a friend. I could have gone in Oliver’s stead.”

Tommy freezes. He honestly never considered that before. “Why didn’t you?” He asks. It’s not accusatory. He’s just curious. He wants to know.

“You try talking Oliver out of something he’s determined to do.” Sara scoffs. “Like arguing with a brick wall. But more importantly than that, I _am_ League. It would have been much worse for me to face the punishment of killing one of our own.”

“Worse than death?” Tommy asks, and then kicks himself for asking. That was a dumb question.

There are a lot of things worse than death. Both of them know that.

“Oliver…” Sara hesitates. “Oliver carried things so that the people he loved didn’t have to. That didn’t make those choices right. It’s just what he did. His desire to protect people was his greatest strength and his greatest weakness.”

“Your point?” Tommy asks.

“Oliver died so others could live.” Sara fiddles with the cap on her water bottle. “So _live_ , Tommy.”

Tommy keeps thinking about that while Sara heads out on patrol. Taking a page from Oliver’s handbook—wear yourself out so thoroughly and maybe you can ignore your problems—Tommy heads for the salmon ladder. The bar is all the way at the top, so Tommy takes a quick hike up the stairs to grab it. Back at the bottom, he hooks the bar over the notches of the ladder. The back of his neck and his shoulders are slick with sweat; he tugs off his shirt, tossing it into his gym bag.

He’s just ready to begin when Felicity comes down the stairs.

She groans when she sees him. “You’re trying to kill me.”

He doesn’t have a ready response, so he starts climbing. Felicity walks over to him slowly, her eyes trailing down from his eyes to his lips, to his chest, and farther down. She bites her lip.

He can’t bear to see her looking at him like that, so Tommy hits the next rung of the ladder. Then the next.

When he reaches the top, she’s still standing below. She’s not so close that he’s in any danger of hitting her when he drops down.

“Felicity,” Tommy says when his feet hit the ground. “You can’t look at me like that.”

“I am,” she says softly, crossing the remaining distance between them. “I _am_ looking at you like this. What... ” She swallows, puts her palm on his bare chest, over his racing heart. “What are you going to do about it?”

There’s no possible way to resist her. He has so many ideas rushing through his head, but they narrow down into a singular goal. Banding an arm around Felicity’s waist, he pulls her against him. The movement is sharp enough that she wobbles on her heels and grips his shoulders to keep her balance. It’s a quick shift of dynamics between them, one that he can recognize as something that’s been repeated over and over throughout their interactions. Felicity offers. Tommy waits to take until she’s ready to give.

He doesn’t kiss her yet, just brushes the tip of his nose against hers, leaning in and pulling back, teasing. The second he sees her eyelashes flicker as her eyes close, he lets their mouths meet.

_Live_ , _Tommy,_ is what Sara said.

He kisses Felicity. He holds Felicity. When he sees her smile and hears her laugh and feels her hands against his skin, Tommy feels alive. He savors it, reveling in the sensations. For a glorious, shining moment, everything is perfect.

“Hi,” Felicity says as the kiss breaks, her breath soft against his mouth.

He touches her face, his fingers framing her forehead, temples, and jawline. “Hi,” he tells her.

She smiles, and it lights up his soul.

“I told you I was scared, before,” he tells her. Her eyes are bright and beautiful, even in the dim light in this section of the lair. “I’m not scared, Felicity. I want this too much to let myself be scared anymore.”

He wipes away the one tear that falls with the pad of his thumb. “Don’t cry,” he tells her.

“But I’m happy,” she says, continuing to smile even as another tear falls. “I’m so happy. I haven’t been happy in...”

“I know,” he says. “But there have been enough tears.”

Her arms tighten around his neck, and she presses her face to the side of his neck, inhaling sharply against his skin. This isn’t her clinging to him for strength or holding onto him out of desperation or grief. This is different. She embraces him like she never wants to let him go. Tommy holds onto her the same way.

* * *

 

They go slow. It’s amazing to Felicity how little and how much changes simultaneously. Hugs hello turn to hello kisses. Sitting down to watch a movie means curling up on the same side of the couch rather than opposite sides. They hold hands when they walk together. 

There’s a rainy afternoon where they do nothing but lie together on Felicity’s sofa and make out. It’s nice, taking the time to get to know each other in this new way.  There’s no pressure, no need to move faster if they don’t want to.

With one of his hands beneath Felicity’s shirt and the other hidden in her hair, Tommy asks, “Will you go out on a date with me?”

Felicity’s busy nipping at his earlobe. She shifts her hips against his and hears his quick intake of breath. “Yeah,” she tells him breathlessly. “Yeah, I will.”

He grins at her, sliding an arm around her waist and turning her over in what is clearly a practiced move. He follows up the action with a deep kiss. Felicity touches his jaw.

“Where and when?” she asks as they break away.

He shrugs his shoulders. “Tonight, if you’d like. Where do you want to go?”

She thinks for a moment. It’s an actual date, so Big Belly Burger seems a bit odd, though she doubts Tommy would mind. Table Salt is where she went with Oliver on _their_ first date, so that’s out too.

Tommy comes to her rescue, naming a restaurant she’s never been to but isn’t against trying. “Does that sound good?” he asks.

She nods, about to return her attention to kissing him when a thought occurs to her. “You’d need a reservation.”

Tommy smiles bashfully. “I have one. Just in case.”

“Just in case?”

“You said yes and didn’t know where else to go.” He shrugs one shoulder. “I like to be prepared.”

“Such a boy scout,” she murmurs, moving to kiss him again. His body shifts beneath her as his fingers cup the back of her neck.

“Felicity,” he says. “The reservation is at six.”

“Okay,” she mumbles, not remotely inclined to move or stop kissing him.

“It’s almost four-thirty.”

She really doesn’t _mean_ to groan, it’s just that this is so nice she doesn’t want to stop.

“We could just go to dinner like this,” she says, pointedly ignoring the fact that her lipstick is definitely smudged, her hair is probably a mess, and her bra is on the floor somewhere. Tommy’s hair is mussed as well, and the top four buttons of his shirt are undone.

He gives her a quick peck on the lips that she tries to turn into a full kiss. “No,” he says. “We really can’t.”

Felicity sighs because the short skirt she’s wearing means his hand is currently _very_ high up on her thigh, and the direction he wants to move it is _not_ the direction she wants him to. “Such a gentleman,” she grumbles teasingly.

“Always,” he agrees with mock seriousness.

She stares at him as he stands up, watches as his fingers begin to swiftly button up his shirt. “Couldn’t you have made the reservation for _eight_?”

He laughs but then bends down for another quick kiss, like he can’t quite get enough of her either. “I can cancel the reservation and we can throw in a frozen pizza?”

That gets Felicity’s attention. “No,” she says quickly, standing up. Whatever this place has to offer has to be better than frozen pizza. She’s had too many frozen dinners recently, and suddenly the real thing—with _wine_ —is very tempting. “We can go to dinner.”

“Good,” Tommy says. “I’m going to run home and put on something more presentable, and then I’ll be back to pick you up in an hour.”

Felicity’s brain is already running through what she has in her closet. She needs something she _doesn’t_ wear to QC all of the time, and she’s not sure if anything in there fits the bill.

She’s halfway down the hall after only a passive wave in Tommy’s direction when she hears him coming up behind her. Swiftly, he grabs her around the waist, spins her around, _dips her_ , and plants his lips on hers.

When she’s upright and on both her feet again, she’s breathless. “What was that about?” she asks when she can find her voice.

“You have to shower, right?” Tommy asks, his voice husky in a way that sends shivers down her spine.

She nods. She’s still thinking clearly enough to grasp what he’s suggesting.

“We could,” she say, thinking of quick and fast in the shower, bodies pressed up against tile. She draws her finger across his jaw teasingly. “Or we could wait until after dinner.”

The press of her hand against his shoulder—the way she moves it to his neck, splaying her fingers against his skin—makes him close his eyes and sigh. “Go slowly,” she whispers. “Take our time.”

He kisses her, slow and deep.

“Savor it,” she manages to say even as she kisses him again, murmuring his name.

He pulls back slightly. She can’t help but notice that his pupils are blown. “If I don’t leave now I won’t.”

“Go,” Felicity says. “Come back quickly.”

 “I’ll buy you really good wine,” he promises. “Whatever kind you want.”

“You’d better,” she says, giving him another quick kiss. “Red.”

“Red,” he agrees easily.

“Go,” she says again, because if he stays here in front of her for even one more minute, she won’t let him go.

He does, with a bashful smile and a longing glance back at her when he reaches the end of the hallway.

True to his word, he’s back in an hour. She can’t help but wish she’d had a _little_ more time—she’s still putting on lipstick and mascara in the car on the way to the restaurant. As soon as she finishes, Tommy takes her hand and laces their fingers together.

True to his word, he lets her order the bottle of wine. After it arrives, he holds his glass up as if to make a toast, and says, “To…” The tilt of his head and the raise of his eyebrows invite her to finish it.

“Going steady,” she finishes without thinking.

“Going steady?” He grins. “Are we going steady, Felicity?”

She knows it’s only technically their first date, but they’ve been through so much together. This date means more than a _lot_ of first dates. “If you want to,” she answers.

“I do,” he says, clinking his glass against hers.

“Good.” She smiles. “I do too.”

For the rest of the evening, Felicity delights in being on a date again, being out with someone again. She loves the way Tommy holds her hand across the table, how he pulls out her chair for her and stands up when she does. He opens her car door for her. In every way, he treats her with incredible care.

His kiss goodnight—well, the _first_ one—is the picture of chasteness. His lips barely linger over hers. The only other places where he’s touching her are where his fingers meet her wrist and where his palm presses against her shoulder blade, sliding gradually towards her spine as he pulls her in.

It’s the second kiss where their bodies meet. A subtle tilt of her head allows Tommy to kiss her deeper.

After that, it’s a good thing she opened her apartment door before they started kissing because they pass Felicity’s comfort threshold for kissing in public—or at least in the hallway of her apartment—by a mile. They spiral together into something hot and urgent, something that burns low in Felicity’s belly.

They keep kissing as they move inside. Tommy’s foot meets the door to kick it shut.

She’s a little unsteady on her feet, but Tommy is right there. His hands are so _warm_ where they touch her skin. When he bends his knees and scoops her up, she follows through the motion as if they practiced it, wrapping her arms around his shoulders. Tommy pushes her against the door, pressing his hips to hers as she struggles to get her legs around his waist. One of his hands comes down to grab her thigh, and that changes the press of their bodies together into something _divine_.

“We said slow,” she manages to mumble between kisses, even as she reaches to undo Tommy’s tie.

“We can go slow.” The fact that his hands are beneath her skirt and even the slightest movement of his hips has her gasping does _not_ make his words ring true.

“Can we go slow in the bedroom?” she whispers. “The doorknob is pressing into my side and it’s uncomfortable.”

He huffs out a laugh, immediately stepping back and dragging her with him. One of her feet lands on the floor, but her other leg is still bent, still pressed against his side. She’s held against him by his one hand on her back and his other hooked behind the knee of her bent leg.

Felicity pushes on his shoulder. “Carry me,” she tells him.

He moves to comply, but instead of lifting her up right where she stands, he turns around, bending at the knees.

It’s the easiest thing in the world to let him give her a piggy-back ride, and Felicity bursts into laughter when, halfway down the hall, she loses both her shoes.

When they reach the bedroom, Tommy tosses her onto the mattress and she bounces, grinning up at him through the wild curls of her hair. Smiling, Tommy crawls onto the bed, body over hers, and they kiss like they have all the time in the world. Fully clothed, over the covers, lazy and laughing.

Felicity quite unintentionally comes from grinding against Tommy’s leg when he slips it between hers. Then she comes again when Tommy peels off her dress and kisses her absolutely _everywhere_ , using his fingers and tongue in all the right places.

And then a third time, completely naked, staring into Tommy’s eyes, as close to him as physically possible, overwhelmed by sensation and emotion. She closes her eyes after, letting two tears escape, but only two. Only because the intensity of the moment has to go somewhere.

Then Tommy is shuddering against her, gasping her name, biting at her lower lip before kissing her again and again.

She touches her hands to his face, closes her eyes as she leans up to kiss his forehead. His arms slip and he falls down against her, heavy and boneless.

In the stillness, Felicity tries to catch her breath, settle her racing heart. Her body feels sticky with sweat, completely sated, utterly exhausted.

Tommy moves first, giving her a lingering kiss before he heads for the bathroom. She hears running water, but is too tired to source it. It’s only when Tommy returns—lifting her by tucking one arm under her legs and the other under her back—to carry her into the restroom that she realizes he was drawing a bath.

He climbs in behind her, lets her lean back against his chest as they both sink beneath the bubbles. She almost falls asleep against him, the warm water lapping gently against her skin.

Tommy washes her hair for her, his fingers moving in gentle circular motions against her scalp.

Neither of them speak. She wonders if he feels the same way she does: warm and cherished and safe. The feelings are overwhelming in the best way, a balm against the worry and sadness that’s plagued her for the past seven months.

As Felicity crawls back into bed with him an hour later, the words _I love you_ hover on her tongue as she says goodnight.

She doesn’t say them, but she feels them. And maybe for right now, that’s enough.

Tucking herself against his side, Felicity lays her hand over the center of Tommy’s chest. He puts his own hand on top of hers.

Peacefully, she sleeps.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next update should be July 21st.


	13. PART TWO: CHAPTER THIRTEEN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The team finds out Tommy and Felicity are together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have I yelled enough about how awesome the ladies who scream at me in google docs about this fic are? Because they're awesome. You can thank Abbie, Kat (storiesofimagination), and Coley (ohemgeeitscoley) for encouraging me to write, telling me when something doesn't work, and just generally helping make this fic into something better than it would have been without them.

There is no intention, on either Felicity’s part or Tommy’s part, to keep their relationship a secret from their friends. But there is also an awareness of a very quickly ticking clock, the knowledge that people will find out sooner rather than later and _telling_ them may be a better idea than just letting them discover it on their own.

To that end, they decide Thea is the one who needs to be told first. There is a discussion in which both of them consider telling her at the same time, but ultimately they conclude that Tommy should be the one to do it.

He doesn’t say much about Thea’s reaction, just that she knows and she won’t spread it around until they tell her it’s okay.

“What did she say?” Felicity asks.

Tommy is silent for a moment, and Felicity’s heart races. “I don’t think she knew what to say. But I think she wants us to be happy.”

“I’m her brother’s wife,” Felicity says quietly. She stares at the unmoving blades of the ceiling fan in Tommy’s bedroom. “I’m her brother’s _widow_. What if she thinks—”

Felicity swallows down a sob. “What if she thinks I didn’t really love him?”

Tommy puts his hand over hers, closing his fingers around her wrist. Gently, he says, “She’d never think that. No one who knows the two of you would ever think that. I promise.”

She doesn’t hide her tears; she just reaches for a tissue from the box on the bedside table. Tommy doesn’t let go of her hand. Once she’s dabbed at her eyes, Felicity rolls over, snuggling into his side, her head on his shoulder. “I love you,” she whispers.

It’s the first time she’s said it. The way his hand stills against her back—where it had previously been trailing soothingly along her spine—confirms that he’s realized that as well.

She tips her head up to look at him and says it again. “I love you, Tommy. I do.”

His face tells her everything she needs to know. Uncertainty, fear, grief, and tender affection. “I love you too.”

She doesn’t think he says those words very often—surely he’s said them to Oliver, to Thea, probably Laurel. They feel heavy. They fill the room, making Felicity catch her breath in the silence. Her heart aches with wonder until she kisses him, and then everything feels right.

* * *

Laurel is next on the list of people to tell, and Felicity is almost more worried about her reaction than she is about Thea’s. It’s been at least two years since Tommy and Laurel were together, but Felicity still can’t help wondering… first Oliver, then Tommy. 

Is she just following in Laurel’s footsteps?

The thought makes Felicity even more hesitant to talk to Laurel, but after a long brunch and two cups of coffee, she swirls sugar into her third cup and blurts out: “Tommy and I are seeing each other.”

Very slowly, Laurel lowers her mug of espresso from her lips to the table. “Okay.”

Silence reigns for a moment.

Laurel taps her fingers against the table. “You’re dating Tommy.”

All of the reasons why she shouldn’t be dating Tommy—every one that Felicity has thought of and summarily dismissed—come flooding back. She can barely look at Laurel.

“I think that’s wonderful.” Laurel folds her fingers together, pressing her hands to her mouth. “I do. You both… you both deserve happiness.” She gives Felicity an odd look. “You do believe that, right? That you deserve happiness.”

“I’m trying to,” she answers. “I’m trying.”

“Felicity,” Laurel says, “I spent the five years after Oliver died hating him—hating _myself_. Our history and my fear that Tommy would be just like Oliver kept me from living my life. From being happy.” She doesn’t say _with Tommy_ , and Felicity appreciates that. “In the end, the person I hurt was _me_.”

“You think I’d be hurting myself?” Felicity asks. “By not being with Tommy?”

“I think,” Laurel says, clearly choosing her words very carefully, “That you’ll hurt yourself if you never move on. Whether that means you’re with Tommy or not, that’s not my choice. It’s yours. But, Felicity—” She hesitates for just a moment. “You and I both know what choice Oliver would want you to make.”

“He’s not coming back this time,” Felicity says because she _knows_ it. Because Sara would never have come home without him if he was alive. Because the blood on that sword was Oliver’s. “We both know that. There’s no...” She looks away from Laurel’s gaze. The words she’s about to say hurt more than anything else. “There’s no reason to wait for him to come back when he won’t.”

“So be happy, Felicity,” Laurel tells her. “That’s what Oliver would want more than anything.”

Felicity nods through her tears. “And what about you?” she asks. “Are you happy?”

Laurel _almost_ smiles. “I’m leaving Starling,” she says.

The floor drops out from beneath Felicity’s feet. “You’re what?”

“I’m leaving Starling,” Laurel repeats. “In two weeks. I’ll come back—I’ll _visit_. But…” She taps her fingers against the table. “There are a lot of masks in this city. Thea. Roy. Tommy. Sara. Diggle.”

“Diggle’s semi-retired,” Felicity points out, even though she doesn’t actually believe that any more than Lyla does. Diggle’s probably always gonna be around, watching over all of them. Their Guardian. Retirement isn’t in his blood, not even with a young daughter.

“Even so.” Laurel folds her fingers together. “I’m moving to Coast City. I have a good job lined up there at a good firm heading up their pro bono cases. I need to find my own little corner of the world to save.”

Years ago, Felicity never would have thought that the idea of Laurel leaving would move her to tears. Now, it’s hard to hold them back. Laurel seems to be having a similar problem.

“There will always be space in the cave for you,” Felicity promises. “And you can always call if you need anything.”

“I know,” Laurel says. The two women stand. Laurel reaches out first, putting her hands on Felicity’s shoulders. “You keep this city safe.” It feels like a blessing, a benediction, the passing on of a mantle Felicity didn’t even realize Laurel had.

Laurel is their team’s very heart. Laurel is everyone’s confidant. Everyone’s friend. Everyone’s support. Oliver’s. Thea’s. Tommy’s. Diggle’s. And somehow, Felicity’s. Because Felicity has always known that Laurel has the entire team’s back. Felicity takes care of her people, and Laurel is invaluable to her. Laurel does what Felicity often cannot. And Felicity isn’t sure how they’ll manage without her.

The two women hug.

When they leave the cafe, they’re strolling arm-in-arm. Like long-lost best friends.

* * *

 

Telling Diggle is easier than telling Laurel. All Felicity has to do is ask for a minute of his time, and he just says, “Is this the part where you finally tell me you’re dating Merlyn?”

She blushes and stammers, “Was it that obvious?”

He taps his temple. “I pay attention.” And then, in a more serious tone, he says, “I’m glad you’re happy again.”

Diggle gives amazing hugs. From the very beginning, he has been a person who makes Felicity feel safe. Secure. Diggle is quite a force to be reckoned with. If hell is coming your way, you want John Diggle willing to put himself between it and you.

“I’m not horrible?” she whispers, terrified of what his answer will be. “It’s been six months. And I still… I still miss Oliver.”

Dig sighs, but it’s not one of exasperation, just thoughtfulness. He walks over to the training mats and gestures for Felicity to stand in front of one of the dummies. She does, making sure her stance is correct. He’s quiet, so Felicity starts punching. Diggle offers critique, and she adjusts herself accordingly.

“Grief doesn’t have an expiration date,” Diggle tells her finally. “You’ll always miss Oliver.”

“Is that…” Another punch. “Is that wrong? Or unfair?”

“Do you think _Tommy_ won’t always miss Oliver?”

That gives her pause. Of course Tommy will always miss Oliver. How could she ever expect him not to?

Diggle seems to take her silence as an agreement. “You won’t stop grieving Oliver because you’re with Tommy. You won’t stop loving Tommy because you’re grieving Oliver. The two things aren’t mutually exclusive, Felicity. You _can_ feel both. Even at the same time.”

Felicity doesn’t bring up Andy and Carly, but she wonders if that’s who Diggle is thinking about. If that’s the life experience he’s drawing from.

“You’re not abnormal,” he finally says. “And you’re not betraying Oliver. And you’re not being unfair to Tommy. You’re just a very brilliant, very complicated human.”

“Tell me the part about being brilliant again?” Felicity teases.

Diggle chuckles. Felicity goes back to beating up the dummy.

* * *

 

Finally, the circle comes back around to Felicity and Thea.

“I don’t understand how it happened so _fast_ ,” Thea says, shoving her spoon back into her pint of pistachio ice cream. “Help me understand.”

“I don’t even know that _I_ understand,” Felicity says. “It just happened. And now here we are, trying to deal with it.”

“Tommy’s…” Thea’s expression goes distant. Felicity gets the distinct impression that she knows what she wants to say, but is trying to summon up the courage to say it. “Tommy’s all I have left, Felicity. My dad, and my mom, and _Oliver_ , and Laurel, and...”

“I know.” Felicity reaches for Thea’s hand. “I _know_. I know what it is to feel alone. But you’re not, Thea. You’re _not_. Neither of us is going anywhere.”

“Why?”

Felicity frowns. “Why aren’t we going anywhere?”

“Why Tommy?” Thea sets her carton on the coffee table. “Of all the people in the world, all the people in this city, why _Tommy_?”

Felicity gives herself the time to think through her answer. “Talk about unthinkable, right.”

Thea wrinkles her nose. “It’s only _unthinkable_ for people who saw you and Oliver together. You two… You were supposed to be soulmates.”

Felicity puts a spoonful of mint chip on her tongue and waits for it to melt in her mouth before she answers. “Maybe we were.” She follows the thought through to its conclusion before Thea can say anything more. “Maybe I got five months of life where I was married to my soulmate. That’s more than a lot of people. Or maybe soulmates aren’t a one-and-done deal. Maybe life gives you more than one.”

Or maybe soulmates don’t exist at all. Maybe there are no such thing. Maybe life is only about who you choose to love and how you choose to love them.

Felicity doesn’t say that. What she does say is this: “Oliver’s life is over because Oliver died.”

“But you didn’t.” Thea finishes the thought for her. “You didn’t die. Your life isn’t over because you didn’t die.”

“I hope so,” Felicity says. “I will love and miss Oliver until my last breath, and so will you, and so will Tommy, and so will everyone that loved Oliver because he was a man who inspired that kind of love. But Tommy…”

A lump forms in her throat. What _is_ it about Tommy? What is it that makes her love him other than _everything_? Describing it feels almost impossible.

“He crept up on me,” she tells Thea. “He showed me love in all the ways I needed it. He took care of me during one of the lowest points of my life. And he showed me the same amount of trust by letting me do the same for him.”

Thea nods. “But it’s so _soon_.”

“Maybe.” Felicity stands up to return both cartons of ice cream to her freezer. When she returns, she sits back down on the couch across from Thea, bending one leg and bracing her side against the back cushion. “But I don’t want slow. I don’t want to waste time. Oliver and I wasted too much. I don’t want to make that same mistake again.”

She reaches over to touch Thea’s forearm. “Neither of us want to hurt you. We love you. You’re our sister.”

Thea’s eyes are watery. Felicity doesn’t say anything as she reaches for the box of tissues she keeps on the end table and passes it Thea’s way.

“It just—” She hides a sob behind a hiccup. “It’s just another reminder that he’s really gone. And the fact that he’s gone _hurts_ , Felicity.”

“I know.” Felicity scoots forward on the sofa, arms open to catch Thea as she easily falls into them, accepting the hug. Felicity rubs her sister-in-law’s back and blinks away her own tears.

“I felt like this when my mom remarried,” Thea says, once she’s backed out of Felicity’s arms. “Like every time I looked at Walter the only person I wanted was my daddy.”

She pauses for a moment, then amends, “My _real_ daddy.”

It’s obvious she means Robert Queen. Felicity nods in understanding, and Thea continues. “It just took time. And this will too. So… be patient with me.”

“We will,” Felicity promises, thinking about Thea’s bi-monthly lunch with her stepfather. It’s been too long since she herself has seen Walter Steele. She should call him and see about getting together. At least for coffee.

Another time. She needs to stay in this moment, with Thea. “How’s Roy?”

Yet another person Oliver’s death hit hard. And he doesn't talk to Felicity about it. Roy would much rather process things with Diggle. He’s too protective of Felicity, too worried about making sure she’s okay to go to her for help.

Thea’s cheeks turn bright red, “He’s good. We’re good. Everything’s… _good_.”

Felicity isn’t sure what to make of _that_. As far as she knows, the two of them are still together, so between Thea’s blushing face and the way her eyes are sparkling, Felicity is pretty sure she doesn’t want to know any more details. She’s content to know as little as possible about her sister-in-law’s sex life, thank you very much.

“Uh-huh,” she intones. “I’m very glad to hear that.” Between her abuse at the hands of Malcolm and the loss of her brother, Thea’s had a rough go of it lately. It’s nice to know she’s weathering these storms _with_ Roy, rather than without him.

If possible, Thea’s blush deepens. “If you say so. We should start the movie,”

Felicity lets the change of subject stand. She decidedly does _not_ want to know any more details. Her active imagination is already taking her thoughts to far. “We’re good?” she asks Thea.

“Yeah,” Thea says, grabbing the TV remote. “We’re good.”

* * *

 

For the past month or so, Tommy’s had a sort of countdown going on in his head, keeping track of the passing of days. It’s one specific day that he’s dreading because he knows it’s going to hurt.

The night before that day dawns, Tommy wakes up to the sound of Felicity screaming Oliver’s name. She’s sitting upright, her hands fisted in the blankets around her. She’s breathing heavily, staring into the darkness of the room around her like she’s not sure where she is.

Tommy says her name as he reaches for her. She startles at his touch, but Tommy keeps a firm hold on her. He pulls her close, tucking her body between his legs, so her back is pressed to his chest.

“We would have been married a year,” she sobs.

“I know, baby,” he whispers into her hair, brushing it back off of her face. Her skin is sticky with sweat. “I know.”

Twisting a bit, Felicity reaches across him to grab a few tissues from the bedside table. She’s still shaking in his arms, still crying. Tommy fumbles about in the dark to slide a few pillows between his back and the headboard. He sinks back, letting his eyes drift shut even as he’s unwilling to let go of Felicity.

She doesn’t apologize. He doesn’t want her to. Moreover, he doesn’t need her to.

They settle into something quiet and comfortable. They’re both lost in thought, both drowning in different and equally complicated feelings.

Were Oliver here, Tommy wouldn’t be holding her. And he treasures the gift of holding her, doesn’t want to part with it for an instant.

But he wants Oliver to be here, wishes it with every fiber of his being.

Even if Oliver being here meant that Tommy would have in this moment been alone in his own apartment, with no Felicity in his arms.

He glances at the clock, hoping against hope that Felicity will fall back to sleep, but knowing that’s unlikely. So he sits and strokes her hair, rubs her back, lets her cry. It’s been a while now since she’s cried like this with him.

It’s four-thirty when she crawls out of his arms, mumbling something about a shower as she wipes at her puffy eyes. Most mornings Tommy would follow her into the bathroom, teasing and playful. He doesn’t today.

Almost on autopilot, he starts the coffee maker, makes himself some toast, and peels an orange. And he thinks about what he needs today, what Felicity needs today.

A few minutes after he hears the water shut off, Felicity emerges from the bathroom, wrapped in a fuzzy pink robe with lollipops all over it and her hair twisted up in a towel. Tommy brings a mug of tea and his toast into the living room and sets them down on the coffee table in front of her. She looks up at him like she’s going to say something, but he cups her cheek with his hand and presses a kiss to her temple.

“Eat,” he tells her. “I’ll be around if you want me.”

He takes his own shower, and when he returns to Felicity, he finds her curled up on the couch, a framed picture of Oliver pressed against her chest in what almost amounts to a hug.

Kneeling in front of her carefully, Tommy gingerly puts a hand on her shoulder. “Sweetheart,” he says. “Why don’t we go somewhere today?”

She opens her eyes. “Where?”

He gives her a sad smile. “Where else? To see Oliver.”

It’s lightly drizzling rain when they arrive at the cemetery, so they tuck in close together beneath the large black umbrella as they follow the concrete path. In her arms, Felicity carries a bouquet of flowers. Tommy holds a single rose. Tucked beneath the umbrella so it doesn’t float too far away is a single green balloon. When they reach the grave itself, Tommy hangs back and lets her go forward, which she does without bothering to take the umbrella from him.

She falls to her knees in front of the gravestone, and Tommy looks away, giving them their moment. It’s not the same as Oliver actually being _here_ , but it’s an acknowledgment, and that’s what _Felicity_ needs. She needs to remember him today, recognize him today.

Tommy waits for her to stand back up before he approaches her. He doesn’t take her hand as he falls into place standing beside her.

“Thank you for bringing me here,” Felicity says, without taking her eyes off of the _‘beloved husband’_ beneath Oliver’s name and the dates of his birth and death.

“Anytime,” Tommy says. “I mean that.”

She nods, reaching forward to brush her fingers across the top of the stone. “Can we stay for a while?”

“Sure,” he tells her.

The rain has stopped. They end up spread out on the grass next to the grave, Felicity lying down parallel to it with Tommy on her other side. It’s almost like she’s cradled between the two of them, Tommy on one side, the ghost of Oliver on the other.

That could be a depressing thought, but somehow it isn’t. After a few moments, she reaches down and covers his hand with hers. When Tommy turns his head, he sees her other palm resting on the grass in front of the headstone.

“Hi, Oliver,” Felicity says, her voice cracking just a little. “We miss you.”

Everything gets quiet for a while after that, but there’s a peace to it. The sun breaks through the clouds, and it feels like hope.

“Do you think we’ll make it a year?” Felicity asks suddenly. “You and I. Without dying or duels or… I don’t even know. Some other horrific attack that leaves us completely changed.”

Tommy and Laurel hadn’t made it a year. Tommy’s hasn’t celebrated a single one-year anniversary, he’s not sure he even celebrated six months. A year feels as long as a century.

He turns his head, staring at Felicity’s blond curls spread out against the green grass, at the beauty of her profile. “I hope so,” he says. Because he does. He wants so much more than a year.

A niggling doubt at the back of his mind reminds him that Oliver did too. Oliver wanted years with Felicity. He wanted _forever_ with Felicity. It’s easy for Tommy to understand because Tommy wants forever with Felicity. In the same way, Tommy wanted forever with Oliver. That’s something both he and Felicity have in common.

After a while, Tommy lifts Felicity’s hand to his mouth and kisses the back. “I’m gonna leave you for a bit,” he says. “I’ll be back.”

“Okay,” she says. She doesn’t ask where he’s going.

He makes his way through the cemetery, down a path he’s walked hundreds of times before. The gray stone stands tall in front of him, but it doesn’t make his heart ache in the same way it used to when he was a boy. It’s different now. Older. A loss he’s used to carrying.

Still, the inscription gives him pause.

_Rebecca Elizabeth Merlyn._

_Loving wife and mother._

_Forever in our hearts._

Tommy kneels. He puts his fingertips against the letters of his mother’s name, tracing the words slowly.

And then he surprises himself. In the aftermath of Oliver’s death, he’d ended up here, staring at the first of the two people he never wanted to be angels. _Watch out for him, Mom_ , he’d said. _Don’t let him get in any trouble._ Because she would. And wherever Oliver was, Tommy wasn’t around to watch him. It was nice to think about his mother taking on the job. Until she could hold Tommy, she could hold the person who was like a brother to him.

Pushing past the emotion in his throat, he stares at the flowers curling above and below Rebecca’s name. “Watch out for Oliver, Mom, will you?” His voice cracks. “Don’t let him get in any trouble.”

Malcolm’s grave is there because the plot was purchased and Malcolm’s will was clear. It makes Tommy violently angry, seeing the gravestone, but also a little perversely relieved. Because he knows where his father’s body really is.

And he is not next to Tommy’s mother.

Tommy leaves the rose in memory of his mother. He leaves the thorns in memory of his father.

The last thing they do at the cemetery is let the green balloon go. Felicity stands in front of Oliver’s grave, the wind whipping her hair forward into her face and pulling the balloon up and away.

“Time to let go?” she whispers softly.

Tommy nods. The green ribbon slips through Felicity’s fingers.

Together, they stand and watch the balloon fly away until they can’t see it anymore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m out of town for all of next week, so that means no update next Thursday. I anticipate updating on August 4th, but it may end up being the 11th instead. Stay tuned to my tumblr for news about when the next update will be.


	14. PART TWO: CHAPTER FOURTEEN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just when life seems to be settling into something resembling normal for Tommy and Felicity, the unexpected happens.

Felicity is half-asleep on the couch with her head in Tommy’s lap when the realization hits her. He’s been watching a cooking show for the past hour, but his hands have been busy playing with her hair. The volume on the show is lowered considerably, and Tommy’s been humming under his breath for the past few minutes.

She’s drifting into sleep, warm and safe, when the thought _can we do this forever?_ floats into her head. It’s a lovely thought, and it pulls her down further into slumber. She’s vaguely aware of Tommy adjusting the blanket around her shoulders.

It’s the sleepiness that keeps her from attaching the significance of that thought to an action right away. Instead, she dozes until Tommy shutting off the TV jolts her gently awake.

She’s greeted by his low chuckle and a soft, “C’mon, let’s go to bed.”

And somewhere between the living room and the bedroom, the half-formed thought that’s been tickling at the back of Felicity’s brain finally sorts itself into words. _Marry him._

He’s pulling at her hand and turning back to smile at her, and Felicity feels like an electric shock is running through her body from her head to her toes. She loves his hair and his eyes and his smile and his face.

And she wants _this_ —what they’re doing now, being _together_ —to go on forever. She doesn’t want it to stop. It can and will change, surely, but it doesn’t have to _stop_.

Suddenly, she’s wide awake. She climbs into her side of the bed and glances over at the open bathroom door to see Tommy brushing his teeth in his undershirt and the pair of pajama bottoms she bought him with pink hearts all over them. Her brain won’t stop _thinking_ , examining all the possibilities, all the potential problems, all the difficulties.

Tommy draws back the covers on his side and fluffs his pillow. Before he settles in, he leans over to kiss her. She cups his face with her hand and draws it out longer than what he probably expected for a goodnight kiss.

When he pulls away, he’s giving her a perplexed look. “What are you thinking about?”

Her stomach does backflips; her mouth opens. Because what she’s thinking… what she’s _thinking_ is…

She starts to say, “nothing,” but what comes out instead is: “Marry me.”

Tommy’s expression moves from surprise to distress to hope in a matter of three seconds.

Felicity licks her lips and tries again. “Tommy. Marry me.”

He looks down, rubs the back of his neck. “Felicity…”

“I’m serious,” she says. “I know it’s the most often used cliche in the book, but I _love_ you and I want—” She stumbles with the words, not stuck on what to say or how to say it, but just the bigness of it all. She could lose so much just by speaking, and there’s too much here that’s too precious for her to give up.

“—I want _this_ ,” she says, gesturing at him and her and the room around them. “With you. For as long as possible. And you can say all kinds of things to me, like that I am being reckless and impulsive or that I don’t know what I’m saying, but I’m _not_ and I _do_ and—”

She stops, drawing in a deep breath and taking his hand in hers. “I love you. I want to marry you. Say yes.”

He’s dropped his head down while she talked, and she can’t see his face, just the top of his head. When he looks up, his eyes are wet with tears, and Felicity’s heart aches with the sudden worry that he’s going to say no.

“Oh,” she says, “I’m sorry, I thought that— But I shouldn’t have said—”

“ _Felicity_ ,” he interrupts. “You really want to marry me?”

There’s an emphasis on that last word, on the _me_ , that breaks Felicity’s heart just a little.

“Yeah,” she says. “I do.”

Leaning over, he kisses her softly on the lips. It feels like a _thank you_.

“Okay,” he whispers. The corner of his mouth jumps up in a quick grin.

She’s helpless to fight her own smile. “Really? Because if this is too fast for you, we can slow it down. We haven’t talked about this at all, and I just up and asked you.”

“Really,” he says. “I want to marry you, Felicity.”

“Good,” she tells him. “Cause I want to marry you too.”

Tommy scoots down a bit on the bed, wraps an arm around her and nuzzles his face against her stomach. She brushes her hands through his hair, scratches her fingernails gently against his scalp. “So how does this work? Do you buy me a ring?”

Felicity laughs. “If you want me to. Do you want me to?”

His eyes are closed, but he shrugs his shoulder. “I think it’s supposed to work the other way around.”

“It can work any way we want it to,” Felicity says. “It’s our marriage.”

“Our marriage,” Tommy murmurs. “I like the sound of that.”

Felicity squeezes her eyes shut as happy tears slide down her cheeks. “So do I,” she tells him, even as she reaches for the switch to the bedside light.

In the darkness, she adjusts the blankets around them both, fitting her body against his in a way she’s done many times before. Wrapped up in each other, whispering late into the night until finally Felicity drifts off to sleep.

Felicity wakes up when she stretches her arm out to reach for Tommy and only finds blankets and sheets. She bolts upright, heart racing, listening for the sound of the shower or coffeemaker—anything to confirm that Tommy didn’t freak out and leave her in the middle of the night.

Their bedroom door swinging open with a _creak_ has her pressing her hand over her heart and breathing a huge sigh of relief. Tommy creeps in with a breakfast tray in his hands.

There’s a little glass vase with a fake rose, a mug of coffee, and a silver dome covering a plate. After Tommy carefully positions the wooden tray over her legs, he lifts the dome to reveal one of his signature omelettes and a small bowl of strawberries.

“You really went all out,” Felicity teases, reaching for the cloth napkin to the side of the plate and sliding off the silver napkin holder. “You do this for all the girls?”

“Only the ones who propose to me,” he teases her back, pressing a kiss to her temple. “How do you think I got so renown for my bedside manner?”

She gives him a disbelieving look. “It’s true,” he says. “It’s all about the morning after routine.”

“Uh-huh,” she intones. “If you say so.”

He steals a kiss. “You’ll have to fill out a satisfaction survey after you finish breakfast.”

Felicity presses her fingertips to the underside of his chin to keep him close for another kiss. “What do I rate? Technique? Presentation? Enthusiasm?”

Breakfast goes ignored for a few minutes as she gets lost kissing him. She pulls back, humming thoughtfully. “Ten out of ten for technique, but nine out of ten for enthusiasm,” she tells him.

He huffs, curling his hands around her shoulders, slowly dragging one up her neck in a way that never fails to send shivers down her spine. “Let me remedy that.”

And oh wow. He does. Eleven out of ten. Maybe twenty out of ten, Felicity’s not sure, it’s tough to calculate when she’d rather spend her brain power appreciating Tommy’s _everything_.

She follows his head with hers when he leans away, but he smooths her hair back from her face and says,  “Eat your breakfast.”

 Snuggling back against her pile of pillows, Felicity pops a strawberry into her mouth. She polishes off most of the omelette, pausing every few bites to offer Tommy an occasional taste.

When she’s just about done, she presses a slice of strawberry to Tommy’s lips and shivers in delight when his tongue flicks out against her thumb. “I kinda like it when you spoil me,” she tells him.

“I should do it more often then,” Tommy says, stretching out on the bed beside her, “I like spoiling you too.”

Biting her lip, Felicity moves the tray to the floor beside the bed. Sliding her fingers through Tommy’s hair, she moves to straddle his hips, kissing the side of his jaw and biting at his earlobe. It’s so easy to make him gasp and catch his breath. Felicity reaches down for the hem of her nightgown, lifting it up and over her head and tossing it aside.

“So spoil me,” she whispers against his mouth.

And _oh_ , how he does.

* * *

 

Tommy and Felicity get married in the middle of the eighth month after Oliver’s death. It’s simple and elegant. Diggle and Lyla are their witnesses.

On the morning of her second wedding day, Felicity runs through her morning routine like everything is normal. The one odd factor is the absence of Tommy. She doesn’t wake up to the sound of him showering or the sight of a hot mug of coffee on her bedside table.

She knew, of course, that he would be gone. He told her as much. In a way, she relishes the quiet and space. There won’t be any bridesmaids, no big rush. Her mother wasn’t even able to fly in—though Donna has promised a visit sometime in the next few months.

Felicity finishes her hair and her makeup and moves over to her dresser to put on the jewelry she’s picked out. She freezes for a moment at the sight of her wedding ring—well, one of them—sitting in the rose-colored ring dish she’d gotten from her mother one Christmas.

 It’s been sitting there for quite some time now. She’d taken it off one morning and felt its absence all day. But she hadn’t put it back on.

She pulls off her engagement ring and slides Oliver’s ring onto her left ring finger. One last time. For a few moments, she studies the way it looks on her hand.

“It’s because of you,” she tells it—tells _Oliver_. “You were…” She blinks back tears she doesn’t want to cry today. “You were the best of partners. I wasn’t even sure marriage was in the cards for me after my dad left. And here I am. Twice in one lifetime.”

She closes her eyes. “Thank you.”

Inside her sock drawer is a black velvet box with Oliver’s ring. She takes it out and opens it. Holding both rings in the palm of her hand, she can’t help but feel like they belong together still.

With great reverence, Felicity settles them both on the velvet cushion and closes the box. She takes the engagement ring and slides it back onto her finger.

Then she pushes the sock drawer shut and goes to check her makeup.

Thea shows up at her doorstep an hour before Felicity is supposed to be at the courthouse.

“Sure you wanna take that Merlyn last name?” she asks, watching Felicity slide on her shoes. “I hear it comes with a _lot_ of baggage and a total bastard of a father-in-law.”

“Tommy’s worth it,” Felicity answers, “and considering the last time I saw that man’s face it was during the last few moments he got to draw breath, I think I’ll be just fine.”

“Damn right on both counts,” Thea says, as she helps Felicity with her hat and veil. “You look _incredible_. Tommy’s jaw is going to hit the floor.”

The sun is shining; the weather is warm. It’s like the day was picked just for them.

With no huge guest list and no party afterward, Felicity soaks in every moment of the ceremony that she can. Tommy looks damn good in a suit, and he looks even better because of the way he looks at _her_.

Felicity’s favorite moment is the one where she gives him his wedding ring. His hand is warm in hers, and sliding the gold ring onto his finger is a moment that takes her breath away.

Thea insists on pictures of the two of them running hand in hand down the courthouse steps, and they oblige. They take a few more, letting Thea pose them. Felicity gets one with Diggle, Dig takes one of Tommy and Thea. Lyla takes one of the four of them.

Felicity’s laughing as she climbs into the dark red convertible. She’s reaching for Tommy’s hand as soon as he climbs in on the driver’s side. He has to start the engine and put the vehicle into gear first, but soon they’re peeling away from the courthouse and his fingers are linked through hers.

Her _husband’s_ fingers are linked through hers.

To her utter shock, they do not make a beeline for the freeway. They planned, she thought, to take the scenic route to National City. It’s early enough in the morning that they have a place planned out to stop for a picnic.

Instead, Tommy heads to Verdant.

For a moment, a flash of her wedding to Oliver fills her mind, having to return to the lair to tackle a crisis while still in her wedding dress.

“Everything’s good,” Tommy says, probably in response to the way her fingers have tightened around his. “I just need to get something. Come inside with me?”

She does, keeping their hands linked.

A burst of confetti hits them the moment they enter, little pieces of shiny silver that flutter down from above them.

Donna squeals and lunges, arms outstretched, for Felicity. “Mom,” Felicity gasps. “What are you…”

She doesn’t have time to finish her question. The room is filled with whistles and cheering.

Thea, Roy, Barry, Cisco, Caitlin, Iris, Sara, Laurel, Quentin, Felicity’s mom, a few of her acquaintances from work, and a few of the employees at Verdant, are all gathered around in a semi-circle, champagne glasses in each hand and a smile on each face. Diggle, Lyla and Delilah slip in a few moments later.

Tommy wraps her arms around her waist and pulls her close to whisper in her ear, “Did you think you were getting away without a celebration? Or a first dance?”

And Felicity laughs.

Lunch is pizza from their favorite restaurant. Dessert is Tommy’s favorite chocolate cake with vanilla ice cream. Cisco hijacks the sound system and plays DJ so the bride and groom can dance to “Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You.”

Then Tommy dances with Donna, while Felicity takes a turn with Barry.

Tommy and Felicity _do_ drive to National City for their honeymoon, they just leave five hours after they initially planned. Stacked on top of their luggage cart is a box of leftover pizza and a Tupperware container with two more pieces of rich chocolate cake.

They end up eating pizza and watching an incredibly dull home remodeling show until Felicity tackles Tommy, straddling his lap and kissing him rather insistently.

They spend practically the entire eight days hiding out in their hotel room.

On the last night, they’re on the floor, tangled in their sheets and in each other.

“We kissed once, you know,” Tommy says, tracing his fingers along Felicity’s shoulder blades, “Oliver and I.”

“Really?” she asks, trying to picture it. “Before—”

“—before the Gambit went down,” he confirms.

She snuggles in closer to him, presses a kiss against his chest. “Was it good? He was always good at that. Kissed either like he was dying or like he couldn’t believe he was alive.”

“Yeah,” Tommy agrees, and she knows there’s more he’s not telling her. She just doesn’t have it in her to push, not when they only have a few more hours left here, where the darkness of Starling can’t touch them. “It was good.”

She hums, wishing she could have seen it. It’s hard to imagine them both as they were then. It’s easier to put the Tommy of now with the Oliver that Felicity remembers. And _that_ , well, that’s a mental image that she could fixate on for a long time.

“And how do I kiss, Mrs. Merlyn?” he asks, teasingly, disrupting her imaginings.

Felicity thinks for a moment. “You kiss like you love me,” she settles on.

“Good,” he says, giving her a kiss that makes her wholeheartedly agree with her own description. 

* * *

 

Felicity Smoak is a card shark. It’s pretty terrible, actually, how often Tommy gets roped into playing with her even though he _knows_ this to be true. All she has to do is bat those eyelashes, and he finds himself forgetting that she could literally _rob him blind_. He’s pretty sure she paid for her college education by sitting at a table in a casino in Vegas.

On nights where there are no huge threats, Tommy will return to the Arrowcave to find Felicity, Thea, Roy and Diggle already circled up around the card table. Tommy assumes that Diggle plays because he’s one of the few who can actually give Felicity a run for her money. The man has an unbelievable poker face.

Roy cheats. Not in the way Felicity does. He doesn’t count cards, but Tommy’s caught him palming them more than a few times.

And Tommy suspects Thea sits down with them because she’s learned that Tommy won’t take the beer in her hands away from her if they’re playing cards. They have rules about going out into the field after consuming alcohol, and he won’t let Thea bend them. Roy either.

But then there are _other_ nights. The team decompresses by going their separate ways. Thea and Roy look at each other like they’re both about to burst into flames. Diggle mutters something about getting back to Lyla and Dee.

And Felicity, well.

Felicity will hold up a deck of cards and wink at him.

There’s one night where nothing particularly dangerous goes down, but Tommy’s limping a bit pathetically from where a baseball bat cracked against his left leg, and Roy’s giving Thea stitches while she aggressively squeezes a stress ball.

Tommy showers, ignoring the blood that rinses down the train from the gash across his right forearm. (He didn’t step in front of the knife; he stepped in front of _Thea_.) He patches up the cut beneath his left eye with a butterfly bandage and tries to keep the weight off of his left side.

When he emerges from the bathroom, Felicity’s waiting for him. She has her purse slung over her shoulder, her car keys in one hand, and a deck of cards in the other hand.

Without a word, Tommy follows her.

They go back to their apartment and sit across the table from each other. Felicity deals.

She doesn’t count. There’s no furrow to her brow, no intense look of concentration, no tapping of her fingertips on the tabletop. She just plays poker like it’s a game.

And when she _loses_ , off comes her shirt.

She likes to be the first to lose. All she has to do is start slowly unbuttoning something and his concentration flies out the window. And then after she’s pulled off her top to let him stare at the dark purple lace of her bra, she’ll win a few rounds. Tommy will peel off his socks and slowly take off his shirt.

Sometimes they go for a few more hands after that. Felicity will shimmy out of her skirt and let her hair down, then she’ll pull off his belt, undo his pants, and drag him down the hallway.

But tonight's a night when the game is nothing but pretense. It’s just code for ‘ _let’s have sex_ ’, and after four months of marriage, Tommy likes to think he speaks Felicity fluently.

Two rounds in, with Felicity’s shirt tossed across the room and Tommy’s shoes off, Tommy decides he’s just not in the mood for cards. He’s not even really in the mood for being teased and tested. Not tonight. Tonight he’s tired.

And he wants his wife.

The deck of cards Felicity was about to shuffle hit the floor with a loud _smack_ when he drops the pretense and just grabs _her_ instead. Tommy shoves her chair back, away from the table so he can pull her up to her feet. Her tiny squeak of surprise is muffled beneath his kiss.

In his haste, the chair tips over, falling on top of the playing cards scattered across the tile.

Tommy does not care. He drags down the zipper of her skirt and helps her step out of it.

They haven’t been like this in a while. Usually, their post-strip-poker sex is a bit more playful, a bit less desperate. The change of pace is exciting.

Felicity sighs happily as Tommy kisses her collarbone, unclasping her bra. It’s her who slows down the pace, bringing his lips back to hers for a kiss that puts him entirely at her mercy. She interlocks her fingers together behind his neck.

He bites at her lower lip, and she shivers—she always does, and it’s why he loves that trick.

She looks up at him again, mouth open slightly, eyes wide, cheeks flushed, and Tommy would absolutely do _anything_ she asked him to do. Give her whatever she needs. Take care of her.

He presses his forehead to hers. His Felicity. His strong, brave, tough, Felicity. Open and loving and everything he needs. All that he wants. Easy to hold in his arms and in his heart. “I love you.”

The words don’t feel like a sufficient description of how he feels. They don’t feel like _enough_.

Felicity’s cheek slides against the stubble along his jaw as she pulls her body against his. She holds onto him tightly. For several long moments, they just stand there, completely wrapped up in each other, swaying ever-so-slightly.

“Tommy,” she says finally, gently. “Take me to bed.”

So he does.

Hours later Tommy wakes up to the sound of a sharp, high-pitched scream coming from the living room. In an instant, his hand is wrapped around the Glock on the bedside table and he’s moving towards the sound. His heart pounds in his ears and his hands sweat.

Felicity is screaming.

Making the turn from the hallway into the living room, Tommy finds himself standing face to face with Nyssa al Ghul. Her hand is clamped over Felicity’s mouth. Fear and anger war in his chest.

“Let her go,” he growls.

“Put the gun down,” Nyssa says. “And I will.”

Felicity nods, and Tommy pulls his finger away from the trigger. He gives Nyssa a look. She loosens her grip on Felicity as Tommy lowers the gun to the floor.

Squirming out of Nyssa’s grip, Felicity runs for Tommy. Easily, he catches her in his arms, glaring at Nyssa over the top of her head. He’s never exactly been unfriendly toward Sara’s girlfriend, but he’s also not inclined to be on good terms with the person who broke into his home and grabbed his wife. “What do you want?”

“A conversation,” Nyssa says. “Where is Sara?”

Tommy and Felicity look at each other. “What do you mean?” Felicity says, and Tommy hates the worry in her voice. “The last time we heard from her she was going to see you.”

“We were supposed to meet.” Nyssa’s voice is as full of concern and fear as Felicity has ever heard it. “She never arrived.”

Felicity’s grip on Tommy’s hand tightens. He feels her tremble, and he readies himself to support her if she’s about to fall.

The daughter of the demon turns away from both of them. “My father—Ra’s al Ghul—”

Felicity’s whole being seems to flinch at the name. Tommy is well aware that while she primarily blames Malcolm for Oliver’s death, she considers Ra’s to have Oliver’s blood on his hands as well.

“What do you need?” she asks.

Nyssa holds out a piece of paper and a cell phone. “This is the last number she called me from, and this is the burner phone we’d use. Can you trace it?”

His wife has a spine of steel. She grabs her laptop from the coffee table and plops down in her favorite spot.

“Let’s find her.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who has stuck with this story during my accidental four-month hiatus. The next three chapters are already written and only need some editing, so the plan is to get new chapters up every week this November. Expect the next update on November 10th.


	15. PART TWO: CHAPTER FIFTEEN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sara returns, bringing news that rocks Felicity and Tommy's world.

A surreal panic washes over Felicity when she learns that Sara is missing. It’s a bizarre sensation of _no, not again_ , and _I cannot fail her too_.

Felicity is an only child. She’s never had a brother or sister, though there were times when she wanted one. Sara took one look at Felicity and did the exact same thing she did with Sin: She declared herself Felicity’s sister, and that was that.

But Felicity’s _also_ become somewhat of a surrogate sister. Thea’s her sister. Roy is like a brother. Even Diggle is like the older brother she never had.

And after years of Felicity’s only family being her and her mom, Felicity’s grown rather protective of this group of people she’s built around herself.

Felicity sits cross-legged on her favorite chair, fingers flying across the keyboard. On the couch to her right, Nyssa sits stiffly, on guard. Tommy’s given up on sleep for the night, and Felicity can hear him fussing around in the kitchen. She hopes he’s making tea. She’d _really_ like some tea.

Felicity glances at the wall clock, then back at her computer screen. If Tommy’s smart, he’ll make coffee. She’s probably not going to sleep tonight.

Sara’s footprints are hard to find. She may have come back from the dead as far as Starling was concerned, but she was still very much a ghost. She used burner phones. She lived in a clock tower. She fought crime at night wearing a blonde wig and a black mask.

The number Nyssa gives Felicity is not the same as the number Felicity usually uses to contact Sara, so she traces them both. The first traces back to the clock tower, so Tommy takes off to check it out, after Felicity insists he make a quick call to Diggle for back up.

She hates to wake up Thea, but it’s _Sara_.

“S’going on?” Thea mumbles into the receiver. “Everything okay?”

Felicity gives her a quick run down of the situation with her shoulder keeping the phone against her ear while she types.

“Thea?” It’s Roy’s voice. Felicity listens as Thea repeats everything Felicity just told her.

“Guys?” a female voice Felicity doesn’t recognize asks. “What’s wrong?”

“We have to go,” Thea says. “We’ll be back. Everything is going to be alright.”

When she starts talking to Felicity again, her voice has snapped back into a business-like tone. “We’ll be on-comms and en route in fifteen.”

With no time to think through recent revelations about her sister-in-law’s personal life, Felicity hangs up and goes back to tracing the other phone. It more heavily encrypted—Felicity’s not even sure _where_ Sara got it—but right as she gets to the good part, Tommy calls.

She pauses the search and turns to Nyssa, who is standing by the wall, staring at all the picture frames covering it. She’s looking at a photo from Tommy and Felicity’s wedding. Felicity calls her over, and it seems to take an abnormally long period of time for Nyssa to tear her eyes away from the pictures.

“She was investigating something.” Tommy’s voice is scratchy, and the video blurs for a moment before it gets clearer. Felicity can see a large chalkboard with a spiderweb of lines and markings. Specifically, Felicity notices a grainy photo from a surveillance camera of a man in a dark black hood, a photo of a vial of blood, and a clear evidence bag with an arrowhead inside it.

At the top, in bold lines of white chalk, the word _Lazarus_ is written in Sara’s handwriting.

Beneath _that_ is the word: _Oliver_.

Nyssa says something that isn’t English. Felicity is going to guess it’s an expletive.

“Do you know what that means?” Felicity asks. “Why would she write Oliver’s name?”

“It means,” Nyssa says, standing up and going back to her pacing, “That she is messing around with things she should not mess around with.”

“Like what?” Tommy asks, and Felicity repeats the question because Nyssa couldn’t possibly have heard him.

“Nyssa,” she yells, fear and frustration giving her voice a sharp edge. “This is _Sara_. My Sara. _Your_ Sara. And I know you value your veil of secrecy, but—” The words tangle in her throat, but she forces them out anyway, “So help me, if you know information that could find her and help me keep her safe, I will personally see to it that there is no where on earth you can hide. I will find you, and I will _end you_.”

Felicity takes a deep breath as the Daughter of the Demon freezes in place. For a moment, Nyssa’s expression is contemptuous. Then her gaze focuses on Felicity, and it seems that she’s actually seeing _Felicity_ standing there.

“The Lazarus Pit is… ancient magic,” Nyssa says. “It is a closely guarded League secret. I cannot tell you more than that. But if my father has found out that she’s investigating it…”

“What would he do with her? Where would he take her?” Felicity asks. The trace for the second phone pings before she can ask _Or is she already dead?_ Both of the women pause, and look down at Felicity’s computer screen.

For a long moment, Nyssa is quiet. Then, very softly, she says, “Purgatory.”

“Purga—” Felicity doesn’t have time to finish the word before Nyssa is out of the room. She races after her, nearly tripping over a pair of shoes she doesn’t remember leaving in the hallway. “He couldn’t possibly be that—”

“Sadistic?” Nyssa asks. “You underestimate him. That’s a deadly mistake.”

“I don’t underestimate _anyone_ ,” Felicity snaps. “I can’t afford to.”

“Good.” One of Nyssa’s hands is on the doorknob; the other is on the hilt of her sword. “You shouldn’t. I need to go.”

“Wait for Tommy—”

“I do not intend to see you widowed again,” Nyssa says, and the verbal slap hits so hard that Felicity physically steps back. “Sara is my responsibility. I will get her. You have my word.”

“What is that worth?” Felicity asks.

“Listen to me, Felicity Smoak, MIT Class of ‘09. Much like Oliver Queen, much like yourself, much like your husband, I look out for those who are mine.” She opens the door. “Sara is mine. I will get her back.”

Felicity watches as the assassin starts down the hall. Nyssa takes five quick steps, then turns on her heel to face Felicity. “And for what it’s worth, I do not make my choices lightly. And I am sorry.”

“For what?” Felicity calls out, but Nyssa doesn’t answer. She lifts her dark hood to cover her face and disappears into the stairwell.

* * *

 

There are some sentences Felicity only expects to hear once in her life.

“Oliver Queen is alive,” is one of them.

Sara’s been missing for a week. Felicity has heard nothing from Nyssa, and even though Diggle insisted on making a quick run to _Lian Yu_ , he hadn’t been able to make any progress finding her.

So when the door to the Arrow Cave bangs open in the early hours of the morning, while Felicity is wrapping up a bit of maintenance on one of her systems, she drops her tablet in shock as she leaps to her feet.

Sara Lance is standing at the top of the stairs. Her blonde hair hangs in loose, damp waves around her shoulders, draped across the white leather of her jacket.

“Oliver Queen is alive,” she says.

“Sara.” Felicity stammers her way through the word. “What are you talking about? Where have you _been_? Nyssa’s been worried; we all have—”

“He’s alive, Felicity.” Sara’s footsteps echo through the room. “Oliver’s _alive_.”

Something inside Felicity snaps. Anger bubbles inside of her. She clenches her teeth. Her eyes burn.

“You saw him die,” she tells Sara, even though she knows that’s something Sara will never forget. “You said—”

“I saw him die,” Sara confirms. “That doesn’t mean he stayed dead.”

“How could he possibly not _stay dead_?” Felicity asks Sara. There’s an ugly bite to the last two words, even as her heart soars with traiterous hope. “How could you know for sure?”

“The League of Assassins has a pit that brings people back from the dead.”

Every fleeting thought of seeing Oliver again, the image of her arms around Oliver’s neck, fades away into nothingness, leaving bitter disappointment stinging Felicity’s eyes. “That’s impossible.”

“It’s not, though.” Sara takes another step towards Felicity. Felicity shys back, suddenly untrusting. In her head, Sara is setting down a bloody sword. Sara is telling her Oliver is gone.

Air is hard to find. Felicity starves for it with gasping, panicky breaths. There’s something heavy and oppressive on her chest.

Sara reaches for her, and this time Felicity lets her friend take her hand. “I know this puts you in an unbearable situation, and you have every right to keep moving on with your life, but… _Felicity_.”

Sometimes Sara says her name the same way he did. “You want me to help you find him?”

“The Lazarus Pit—the supernatural spring that can reverse death—was used _five hours_ after he died,” Sara says. “Tell me that’s coincidence.”

_No_ , Felicity’s brain screams, like a firm denial will stop her heart from daring to hope. _He was stabbed through the right lung. He fell three stories into the snow. No magic or medicine on earth could have saved him._

Oliver is gone. Sara is wrong. Sara _has_ to be wrong.

Sara’s not wrong.

Mysteries have tickled the back of Felicity’s neck for years. Where is her father? Why did he leave? Who is the Arrow? Where is Walter Steele? What happened to Oliver Queen on that island?

_Who, what, where, when, why_ , and _how_ are at the core of Felicity’s brain. They make up the drive that pushes her to explore, create, and problem-solve. Mysteries have always been her greatest motivation.

She takes what Sara says and mentally examines all the _ifs_. If Oliver is alive, _where_ is he? If he is alive, _how_ did he survive?  _What_ has he been doing all this time?

_Why_ hasn’t he come back?

For the first time in almost a year, Felicity starts looking for Oliver Queen again. She sits on her sofa, laptop open on the coffee table, and stares at the searches running on the screen.

Tommy sits down beside her.

“You can’t let me get lost in this again,” Felicity says. “I can’t… I am doing this for Sara. And I know that’s why I’m doing it, but… Tommy.”

She rips her eyes away from the laptop to look at him. “Don’t let me lose myself in this. Promise.”

“Hey,” he sets a hand on her thigh, squeezes gently. “I’m not gonna let you get lost in this. I promise. But if there’s a _chance_ , you know we have to find him.”

Felicity nods. “I know.”

Five weeks later, it’s not a computer ping that changes everything, but a phone call from Sara. “He’s alive. He’s on his way home.”

With shock numbing every part of her body, Felicity ends the call and sets down her phone. She stares at nothing in particular for a long time.

Across the room, Tommy clears his throat. She looks up at him with eyes full of tears. “Oliver’s alive. He’s coming home.”

* * *

 

Tommy hears the clock start counting down the moment Felicity says the words, “Oliver’s alive.”

The floor drops out from under his feet, and he wants to sink into oblivion right with it.

It’s almost as if he can hear the tearing sound his heart makes when it rips in half. Elation swoops through him, followed swiftly by this crushing, consuming guilt.

“Are…” he has to clear his throat to keep his voice level. “Are you sure?”

“As sure as I can be.” Felicity’s still not looking at him. She stands, anxiously walking a few feet towards the hallway, then turning to walk back to her previous spot by the couch. “Sara says… I-I won’t be able to believe it until he’s standing right in front of me.”

Tommy finds the armchair across the room and helplessly watches while she paces. Every so often she stops moving and beings anxiously wringing her hands.

His gaze wanders to the framed picture on the table beside his chair. It’s a small frame. Only a few inches high, one of the few photos they’d taken at their wedding.

The two of them are right outside the courthouse. They’re looking at each other. Felicity’s still wearing a white hat and birdcage veil. She’s holding onto her flowers with one hand and him with the other.

The picture doesn’t show the bottom of Felicity’s dress, but Tommy remembers it vividly. It was a knee-length, a-line dress, very vintage looking. Lace all over the sleeves.

What Tommy remembers with the most clarity is fussing with the petticoat beneath her skirt while he undressed her. He’s seen her on both her wedding days, and on both occasions she looked stunning. He thinks it’s probably natural that he appreciates this one more.

They were a whirlwind. An accident.

A lighthouse. One solid beam of light in an otherwise black-as-night storm.

Felicity falls back against the couch. “I hate waiting,” she says softly.

Tommy holds out his hand, palm up, and crooks his first finger at her. “C’mere.”

She does. She moves slowly, as if each step costs her. Once she reaches him, she takes his hand and sinks down easily onto his lap, tucking her legs off to one side.

Bringing her hand to his mouth, Tommy kisses her palm. That’s the moment she starts to cry.

“I didn’t look hard enough,” she sobs. “I gave up on him too soon. All this time and I…” Another hiccuped sob. “I just _stopped_ looking, Tommy. What kind of wife does that?”

He presses her close. Kisses the top of her head. Strokes her hair. Right now she needs _him_.

That’s why he stays.

“You are the smartest woman in the history of the universe,” he tells her. “You are amazing, and I lov—”

He chokes on the word, dropping his head so his forehead lands on her shoulder. What they’re not saying—that Oliver is out there and alive and that this fact changes _everything_ —feels like a physical ache in his chest.

He feels Felicity’s lips against his temple, feels her body shift against his. “I love you too,” she whispers, lips against his ear. “Nothing changes that. _Nothing_.”

Tommy wishes he knew how to believe her. He’s walked down this road before, sung this verse.

He kisses her mostly so he doesn’t have to think about it, but also because he wants _her_ , he wants this moment with her. This one is his.

And maybe that makes him selfish, but he’s going to take it. It’s his ring on her finger right now.

Felicity hums in the back of her throat. Her kisses are quick and breathy, almost desperate.

Slowly, Tommy inches his hand up her thigh. He pushes up the material of her skirt and lets his nails lightly scrape against her bare skin as he draws his hand back down to her knee. Felicity squirms. She likes that trick. It distracts her, and Tommy takes the opportunity to kiss beneath her jaw, down her neck, against her collarbone.

Her legs are wobbly when she stands up, and her grip on his hand is loose when she pulls him in the direction of the hallway.

Silently, he follows.

When Felicity reaches the bedroom door, she turns so she faces him, taking small, backwards steps. Starting with her cardigan, her fingers quickly skim down the line of buttons. Tommy reaches for her, taking the shoulders of the garment and sliding it down her arms. He kisses the tops of her shoulders as she helps him pull it off.

Her dress has a tie at her natural waist, and that’s the place his hands find next, pulling at both ends until the bow comes undone and the long strips of material hang loose at her sides. He pauses to trace her collarbones, draw his fingertips up the line of her neck. She leans into his touch. Her eyes drift shut, and the rhythm of her breathing changes.

It always fills him with a sense of pride that he can do this, make her feel like this, just from simple, easy touches. And if he never gets to do it again, well, he’s going to remember every moment of this time.

And damn, if this is the last time, or one of the last times, there’s so much he wants to _do_. He pulls her close, captures her lips with his, and works on the zipper of her dress. The dress is sleeveless, and once the zipper is loosened, it falls down to the floor at her feet.

Tommy can’t resist the urge to pull back so he can look at her. She’s not shy, never really has been. All of her nervousness the first time they did this was clearly about him being the first since Oliver.

“God, you’re beautiful,” he tells her, his voice low. He lets his hands wander. There’s so much of her to touch. There are so many ways he wants to touch her. “Bed,” he groans, when her hands stray to undo his belt. “Bed, now.”

She doesn’t take her eyes off of him as she backs up, so familiar with the room that she’s able to do so without tripping or stumbling. Climbing onto the bed, she maneuvers onto her knees, facing him. Mimicking his own voice and tone, she says, “Clothes off. Now.”

He chuckles, but removes his shirt as he walks over to her. He likes the way her gaze drifts down his chest. Felicity stretches out her hand and grabs the waistband of his jeans.

“C’mon,” she says, flicking open the button and tugging down his fly. He pulls off his jeans clumsily, but returns to her by catching her face in his hands and giving her a long, slow kiss. Turning her head to break the kiss, she presses her body into his, kissing his neck, nipping lightly at his earlobe.

Tommy curses under his breath. Everything about her is amazing, incredible. A surge of emotion swells in his chest, and he clings to her, unsure how he could ever expect himself to let her go. He disguises the sudden prickle of tears in his eyes by hiding his face against the side of her neck. Sliding his hands around her ribcage, he works open the clasp of her bra. Throwing it aside, he gives her a gentle nudge, and she falls onto her back, hair fanning out beneath her head.

Tommy crawls over her, settling between her legs with an arm on either side of her body. He kisses down her breastbone, turning his head a little to kiss one breast, then the other. She makes the softest, most satisfied noises when he works her up like this, so he indulges himself by taking his time.

There’s no rush, not when he would much rather stay in this moment forever, with Felicity’s heels pressing against his lower back and her hands in his hair.

Apart from the murmurings that aren’t actually words—with the exception of _please_ , _yes_ , and _Tommy—_ she’s quiet. When he looks up, her eyes are closed and her mouth has dropped open, and _that’s_ a sight he needs burned in his brain for all of eternity.

Her white and blue polka-dotted underwear are still on, and he wishes like _hell_ that they weren't. He leans back so he’s upright and on his knees between her legs, and slowly draws them down her thighs when she pulls her knees up towards her chest to help him. Uncaring about where they land, he throws them aside and grabs Felicity’s ankles instead.

After he’s kissed from her ankles to the inside of her thighs, he arranges himself so he’s half off of the bed, her legs hooked over his shoulders. A shudder runs through her when he lowers his mouth to her sex, and he feels it.

He eats her out reverently, spurred on by the way she moves under his mouth and the taste of her wet and wanting on his tongue. He goes slow, gentle, just the way she likes, exactly how he knows that she needs.

Very soon she won’t need him. But he’ll be damned if he doesn’t make sure she _remembers_ this. Every moment of it.

The only thing he can focus on is Felicity and trying to make her feel good, trying to—

His chest feels tight. He hasn’t felt the need to prove anything to himself or her in at least a few months now. That the ugly inadequacy bubbling in his chest is back is crushing. His whole body is tense and aching with need and want that he won’t even acknowledge because he needs _this_ first, needs her saying his name and arching off of the bed with that cry that bursts from deep inside her that she couldn’t _ever_ hold in.

The pull of her hand in his hair gets his attention.

“I’m good,” she whispers. “I’m good, I’m _so_ ready just—” She sucks in a sharp breath when he slides a hand beneath her body and caresses from her lower back to her thigh. “Roll over, please?”

He hasn’t made her come, though she doesn’t seem to care, and far be it from him to deny her _anything_. Turning onto his back beside her, he pushes himself farther up on the bed. She plants her knee on one side and straddles his body, and he clenches his jaw. Hooking his hands behind her thighs, he tugs at her. “C’mere,” he says. “Let me make you come first.”

“Not right now,” she whispers, leaning back in the opposite direction. She tortures him the same way he tortured her, kissing her way down his chest, swirling her tongue around one nipple, then the other. “We have time.”

They _don’t_ , and that knowledge is eating at him. They _don’t_ have that much time. He stutters her name, but she backs all the way off of the bed, dragging his briefs with her.

He thinks he just might die of bliss when she crawls back up his body, settling herself over him, all her skin against all of his, soft and warm and _right_. She sinks into his arms, and he gets lost in her kisses, lost in the way she’s rocking against him, slow and teasing and _almost_ right where he wants her to be. And maybe it’s just that he’s been ignoring his own wants for too long, but Tommy is suddenly desperate to be inside her, like he might spontaneously combust if he doesn’t.

He probably holds onto her too hard, probably is just a little too rough, a little too consumed by the need to be close to her, wrapped around her, buried inside her, but she’s the same way. She kisses him like she wants to _devour_ him, like she’s giving and taking _everything_ and it’s still not enough.

She gets herself into position and aligns them just right before she takes him inside her. He murmurs a litany of _fuckfuckfuckfelictiy_ and grabs fistfuls of the sheets.

She’s just started to move when realization hits Tommy. The first time they had sex it was like this. Hushed, desperate, both of them so overwhelmed with emotion that they could barely speak. He’d tried to etch every part of her into his memory, so sure there was never going to be a next time. He made her come with his mouth and his fingers, and she’d cried when he did, one of her hands hand in his hair, the other curled in a fist and pressed against her mouth. He’d wondered in that moment if she was thinking about Oliver.

But the only name she said that night was his. And there were so many different ways she’d said it. High and breathy, low and moaning, loudly and softly. Mingled between words like _more_ and _harder_ and _please_.

This feels like that.

He sits up. It throws off Felicity’s movements, and she makes the most gorgeous sound at the change. It’s not a good position for penetration, but at the moment he doesn’t quite care. He kisses the tops of her breasts and drags his fingers down the line of her spine.

“I know what you’re doing,” she murmurs. “You are not allowed to think this is goodbye.”

“Felicity,” he whispers, because that’s the only word left in his head. Keeping one arm banded around her waist, Tommy twists the two of them around, planting one palm on the mattress so that he can lower Felicity onto her back. She yelps, but it’s surprise rather than pain.

“Tommy,” she says, “I’m serious. This is not _goodbye_ , and you don’t get to treat it like that.”

“What is it, then?” he asks.

She caresses the back of his neck. “It should be _I love you_.”

That he can do. “I love you,” he whispers as he moves inside her. “I love you. I love you. I love you.”

She whispers it back, and the comfort of it flows through him.

Her breathing and the way she’s rolling her hips tells him that she’s close. Slipping a hand between their bodies, Tommy uses two fingers to gently rub her clit.

“Please,” she whines, digging her nails into his skin, scratching his shoulderblades. The light pain contrasts against the pleasure of thrusting into her, and he can’t hold back a breathy groan.

“Look at me,” Tommy begs, and her chin drops while her eyes flutter open.

She doesn’t break her gaze as she whispers, “Please make me come. Please. You’re so good at it. So good, so—”

Her whole body goes tense, and he watches her fight to keep her eyes open as she comes.

“Gorgeous,” he tells her, kissing her neck, tasting salt and sweat. “So damn pretty when you come like that.”

She smiles up at him sweetly. “Your turn.”

There’s no need for more encouragement than that. Every movement already feels like the right side of too much. He holds onto her as tightly as he can, presses his body firmly against hers, and lets go.

Felicity laces her fingers together behind his head and whispers loving words in his ear, sending shivers down his spine. From the way the words easily tumble from her lips, she’s not even really thinking about them. They’re right from her heart, spilled into the world while she basks in her afterglow.

It takes Tommy a few moments to come back to himself, lost in the sudden warmth of satisfaction seeping into his bones. He turns over onto his back, and she snuggles into his side, laying her hand over his heart. She’s humming a familiar tune, and he chuckles when he recognizes it.

He doesn’t quite realize he’s softly singing before the notes hit the air. “...what can make me feel this way?”

He kisses the top of her head. “My girl.”

He hears a tiny sniffle and feels wetness on his bare chest. He closes his eyes and strokes her hair, comforted by her touch and her presence and needing to give a bit of that comfort back. “Talking ‘bout my girl.”

_My girl._

* * *

 

In the morning, Felicity walks into the living room and stops short when she sees the small black box on the coffee table. Tommy’s sitting on the couch in front of it, elbows on his knees, head in his hands. He looks up when she enters.

“Why is that out here?” she asks.

“Because it’s his. And he’s yours.” Felicity knows how bitterness sounds from Tommy’s tongue and this isn’t it. This is resignation.

She’d prefer bitterness, she thinks. Bitterness can be argued with.

Felicity shakes her head, fighting the panic attempting to claw it’s way up her chest. “No. I’m not doing this right now. I can’t. Do not do this to me, Tommy. Don’t—” her voice breaks. “Don’t you _dare_ …”

“We both know how this is going to end, Felicity.”

“No,” she says firmly, moving to kneel on the floor between his legs, letting her hands rest on his thighs. She stays mostly upright, her hips pressed against the edge of the sofa, so she’s as eye-level with him as possible. “No, we don’t. You do not get to give me his wedding ring and then just _walk away_ from me. You do not get to try and be that _fucking_ noble when we both know you’re just scared.”

“It’s not—” he swallows, looks away from her.

“Not what? Not _fair?_ ” She cups his neck with her hand in the way she knows he finds soothing. “Nothing about this is fair. The odds of any other set of human beings finding themselves in this exact situation are astronomically high. There’s no precedent for this. _We_ get to decide what we do next. You and me and Oliver. This impacts all of us.”

He presses his forehead to hers, and she’s comforted by the knowledge that he’s listening to her. He’s trembling just a little, but he’s not pulling away. She knows what the two rings in the box look like, Oliver’s and hers, nestled next to each other. But she also knows what the ring she’s wearing now looks like when she sets her hand on top of Tommy’s and both of their wedding bands catch the light.

“You have given me happiness during the worst time of my life. Please don’t just throw us away like we were nothing.” Felicity takes his left hand in both of hers, presses her thumbs against his wedding ring. “ _You_ are mine too.”

“I don’t—” He turns his hand over, laces his fingers through hers. “I don’t want to make this harder on you—when you choose him.”

Pain lances through her, sharp, quick. Not _if_. When.

“Tommy Merlyn,” she whispers, brushing the backs of the fingers of her free hand against his cheek. She wants to tell him how he breaks her heart by thinking so little of himself. “You have never been my second choice. Just the _next_ one.”

“Felicity…”

She shakes her head at him. “This isn’t going to be easy for any of us. There are things we’re going to have to figure out. And we have to keep _talking_ to each other for that to happen.”

“I never wanted to hurt him,” Tommy says, after a long moment of silence. “I never wanted to hurt him, but I loved Laurel and I hoped that everything would all work out, but Laurel was Laurel and you’re—”

“Do you think he’s going to hate you?” Felicity asks. “Tommy, I don’t think that’s possible.”

“He won’t understand,” Tommy tells her. “It’s _you_. His _wife_.”

“Yours too,” she says. “And maybe he won’t understand at first, but we’ll make him. We’ll _help_ him.”

He looks down at her adoringly. “I don’t think I’ve ever loved you more than right this moment.”

“Good,” she tips her chin up in anticipation of a kiss. “The feeling’s mutual.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next update on November 17th. Be there or be...square?


	16. PART TWO: CHAPTER SIXTEEN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the other side of the world, Oliver Queen just wants to go home.

Oliver screams. The sound echoes through the darkness of the room, bouncing off the stone. He falls. He lands hard on the cement floor, pain splintering up his thigh as his left knee takes the brunt of the impact.

He’s alone. He’s alone, and more importantly, Felicity isn’t here. Neither is Ra’s. Or anyone else.

Moonlight filters in from the high stone window, just barely allowing him to make out the room—the cot he’d fallen from, the small table beside it. Groaning in pain, Oliver crawls back onto the cot, twisting so that he rolls onto his back. His knee throbs.

He sighs, closing his eyes. Felicity isn’t here. She wasn’t strapped down, there was no brand against her shoulder. He didn’t have to listen to her screaming. He didn’t have to watch as—

“She’s not here,” he whispers. “She’s not here. She’s not here. She’s not here.”

She’s safe in Starling. Safe and unharmed and far, far away from this hell. She’s with Diggle. She’s with Tommy. Neither of them will let anything happen to her.

He looks up at the wall, at the tally marks he’s painstakingly etched into the stones to mark the days. Over 300, in total, stretching across the walls. Ten months.

Ten months of Felicity thinking he died. That he left her.

Ten months of brutal training, pushing himself to the limit, jumping to Ra’s’ orders or preparing to pay the steep price of defying him. Ten months with no sign of Sara, no word of Nyssa.

Ten months with no way of escape. Ten months of getting beaten for trying.

He forces himself to take deep, even breaths. Ten months of falling back into old patterns. Ten months of _survive_ being the drumbeat he marches to.

He doesn’t sleep for the next hour, staring up at the ceiling, trying to remember something good. Something to cling to during this next day. Diggle’s quiet presence. Tommy’s embrace. Tommy’s grin. Felicity’s hair tickling his nose. The feel of her hand in his. The colors of her nail polish. The taste of her lips.

The sound of the deadbolt releasing on his cell door has him standing to attention, feet apart, hands clasped behind his back, expression stoney. He thinks of Felicity’s toes running over his shin beneath their table at Jefferson's. Tommy’s laughter right before he downed his third shot of vodka at Oliver’s bachelor party.

Two guards flank a figure dressed entirely in black. Only their eyes show, but they carry themselves with authority and purpose. The guards stop outside the door, but the figure in the middle continues into Oliver’s cell.

“Leave us.” It’s a woman’s voice, sharp and familiar.

Oliver doesn’t dare speak her name. The guards shut and lock the door behind the woman. Their footsteps fade down the hall.

She waits for silence before she removes her mask, pulling it back over her head. Oliver knows those brown eyes, that dark hair, that steely gaze.

“You are a hard man to find, _Al Sa-him_ ,” says the Daughter of the Demon.

Oliver bites his tongue. He’s incredibly hard to find. If he wasn’t, Felicity would have—

He squashes the thought. The fact that Nyssa is standing in front of him means he may have a way out, may have a way to go _home_.

The very word makes his heart ache.

“Nyssa,” his voice is gravelly. He bows his head out of respect. “I—”

“Silence,” she snaps. “Do you know why you are here?”

He doesn’t. He’s stopped asking. No one ever answers that question. Without a word, Oliver shakes his head.

In front of him, Nyssa begins to pace. She moves slowly and keeps her eyes on Oliver, like a predator circling its prey. She has all the power in this room. “You are strong. A warrior. Raw and unbroken in my father’s eyes, but he believes his hands are skilled enough to make you into what he wants you to be. And what he wants is someone who will be—” She snaps her mouth shut, cutting herself off. “You owe the league a debt.”

That’s what Ra’s said. He sacrificed his life for Thea’s, but this second life that the league has given him has—in their eyes—put him back into their debt.

“Fortunately, this debt is something that I can help you repay,” Nyssa tells him. “For a price.”

“Why would you do that?” Oliver asks. “Take this with all the respect due to the Heir of the Demon, but you don’t care about me at all.”

“You want to go home,” Nyssa says. “I am offering you a way to go back. To your friends.”

Tommy smiling during his first homecoming. Tommy’s arms around him. Tommy fighting beside him.

“To your sister.”

Thea. Thea’s laugh. Thea watching stupid TV late at night with him in the den. Strong, smart, beautiful Thea.

Together Thea and Tommy were the only good thing Malcolm Merlyn had done for the world.

“To your _wife_.”

Felicity’s fingernails pressing into the skin of his forearm when their movie got a little too intense for her. Felicity’s touch. Felicity’s voice.

A strange, eerie smile curves along Nyssa’s lips. “You want to see your beloved again. What does it matter to you what my motivation is?”

Oliver steels his spine, throwing his shoulders back and sending his thoughts of Felicity and Tommy far away. That temptation could be his undoing, and he knows it. “It matters. Your father took me away from my friends, from my city, from my best friend, from my _wife_. You are his daughter. His heir. Why should I trust you?

“Those things belonged to Oliver Queen,” Nyssa says, with a venomous bite to her tone. “But Oliver Queen is dead. You are _dead_. I am your only chance to get _any_ of those things back. You are a man who does what is necessary to survive. You know when your only way of escape appears in front of you. You also have to have figured out by now that the longer you resist my father, the greater you endanger your family and friends. My father knows how to use bargaining chips, and your sister and your marriage to Felicity Smoak are both a matter of public record. Time is _not_ on your side.”

Oliver’s too stunned to respond. He wants a bow. He wants a sword. He wants to rip Ra’s al Ghul’s heart out of his chest with his bare hands.

Because he aches to go home. He had one, before this mess. He had a home, a team, a best friend he would die for, and a standing coffee date every Sunday morning at Jeffersons with his wife.

On the island, he’d gotten so used to his new normal, to struggling and suffering and surviving. He’d gotten so used to it that when he came home, it was what he expected to do there too.

But all that had changed. _Felicity_ had changed it.

And now he can’t fall into those patterns of struggling and suffering and surviving as easily as he did before. They chafe at him, at the raw edges of his soul.

He wants Felicity. He’s angry that he’s spent ten months without her. He’s heartbroken by the thought that she probably thinks he’s dead.

“What—” Oliver’s throat is dry. “What is your price for getting me home?”

For a long moment, Nyssa doesn’t say a word. Then, so quiet he has to strain to hear her, she says, “Sara. She is no longer safe inside the League. I need to change that, and I need you to help me.”

“How?” Oliver asks. “How could I keep Sara safe when you can’t? You’re the _Daughter of the Demon_.”

Nyssa waves her left hand in a quick, cutting motion, and Oliver stops talking. Without even a hint of emotion she says, “I am going to kill my father.”

Oliver stares at her, stunned. “Ra’s al Ghul?”

“Yes,” she snaps, a viciousness that fills hearts with terror edging into her voice. “It is past time this organization were mine. It is my birthright. It is time that I take it.”

Staring right into his eyes, with a voice as deadly as sin, Nyssa says: “And you’re going to help me do it.”

Training with Nyssa is different from anything Oliver has ever done before. Every once in awhile, she reminds him of Shado, endlessly patient, willing to run him through the same exercises over and over again. She doesn’t make him slap bowls of water for hours, so that’s something.

(Had he made Thea slap water when he worked with her on her bow skills? Oliver can’t remember.)

They can’t train during the day, so Nyssa’s guards drag him out of his quarters every night, throwing him onto his knees in front of her on the training mats. It’s not the last time he hits the floor when they spar.

Even though Oliver knows how to use a gun and fight hand-to-hand, he hasn’t really trained with a sword. Only a little with Slade on _Lian Yu_ , of course, but he liked the feel of the bow and arrow in his hands better. He liked Shado’s breath on his neck and her hands on his skin.

She was steady, relaxed. Nyssa is not. Nyssa is calculating. She eyes him up and down; she takes a note of his every step, his every breath.

With the very real sword in his hand, Oliver contemplates escape. Nyssa has ordered her guards to leave the room. She alone stands before him, and the temptation to simply knock her out and escape on his own burns inside him. But her warriors are at the doors. She has told him as much. He doesn’t fear the pain they would inflict on him for an escape attempt, but he does fear the possibility that Nyssa will decide she doesn’t need him, that she will find another way to kill her father.

She walks him through parries and thrusts. She pushes him almost past his breaking point, fighting him with advanced techniques that she makes look effortless.

After one particularly painful crash onto the mats, Oliver groans and snaps, “Why can’t _you_ just fight Ra’s?”

Nyssa sheathes her sword and offers Oliver her hand. He hesitates before he takes it. “Why would I?” she asks. “When you can do it for me? When he will not see you coming? When you can challenge him to a duel and his pride will demand that he fights fairly?”

“ _You_ could challenge him to a duel,” Oliver points out, back on his feet.

“And if I failed?” Nyssa’s hand is on her sword. “He would have no reason not to kill Sara. I will not risk that.”

That’s something Oliver can understand. It’s one thing to gamble with your own life. It’s another to gamble with the life of someone you love.

He steadies his footing and prepares to go again. At least, he thinks, if he dies again, Felicity won’t have to mourn him twice.

Hours later, he returns to his excuse for a bed, body weary with exhaustion, and sore muscles protesting. He sleeps only for a few hours before different guards—Ra’s’ guards—shove an unappetizing breakfast into his room and then escort him to his official League training.

They are trying to break him, crush his spirit and twist his mind, but Oliver won’t be broken. He’ll play along. He’ll parrot their words back to them and behave like a good little soldier. It’s what he’s been doing all along. Just another mask to add to his collection. The Arrow. Ollie. _Al Sa-him._

With a plan to get out, with a way to do exactly what Oliver’s wanted to do from the beginning, he keeps a tiny spark of hope inside him. Hope to see Tommy again. Hope to hug his sister. Hope to hold his wife. Hope that home isn’t as far away as it feels.

He knows it’s dangerous. He knows he’s learned this lesson before, that even the smallest seed of hope can be taken away in an instant, and that the aftermath is crushing, devastating.

But Oliver can’t stop it. It keeps him moving through hours of gruelling work, through Ra’s’ attempts to break him, through the nights where he can’t sleep because he sees a dying Felicity or a dying Thea or a dying Tommy in his dreams.

He hides that tiny bit of hope deep inside him, and he waits for the storm to pass, for Nyssa to decide it’s time to strike.

And then Ra’s strikes first.

* * *

Oliver’s first mission for the league is a success.

It’s the fact that the guards shove a thick, dirty rag into his mouth and tie it behind his head that tells Oliver the men who’ve come for him aren’t Nyssa’s men. Those men manhandle him a bit, sure, but just to keep up appearances. These men place a piece of curved, sanded wood behind his neck, lining it up parallel to his shoulders and fastening his wrists into the leather cuffs on either end.

It pulls on the shoulder he landed hard on the night before with Nyssa, but Oliver digs his teeth into the foul tasting rag between his lips and plants one foot in front of the other.

The guards bring him to an audience with Ra’s. They shove him onto his knees, and with no hands to catch him, Oliver nearly falls on his face.

Ra’s holds a photo in front of his face as he rips the gag out of Oliver’s mouth. It hangs limply around his neck. “You recognize this person?”

Oliver nods. The image is grainy, shot through a window.

It’s _Felicity._ She’s at her normal table at Jefferson’s, a cup of coffee held in her two hands. Across from her, almost entirely cut off by the picture, is Tommy.

Seeing them like that, together, alive, looking out for each other, gives Oliver a strange surge of calm. Tommy won’t let anything happen to her. Felicity won’t let anything happen to him.

Ra’s strikes him with the palm of his hand. The blow barely stings, but Oliver knows that wasn’t the point. “I recognize her,” he chokes out.

“Who is she, _Al Sa-Him_?” Ra’s says.

For a moment, Oliver doesn’t know what answer Ra’s wants. It earns him another hard slap across the face, but the use of the name _Al Sa-Him_ has given him a clue as to the answer Ra’s wants. “She was Oliver Queen’s wife.”

“You recognize what I will do to her if you run, if you disobey, if you escape, if you harm _any_ of my men?”

Bile rises in Oliver’s throat. He swallows it back down.

_Survive._ Just a little longer. Just a little bit longer until he and Nyssa can make their move and his family can be safe from the League of Assassins forever.

“Good.” Ra’s frees Oliver’s hands. The wooden yoke is taken away by one of Ra’s men.

Oliver resists the urge to rub his raw wrists. He holds back the yearning to rise to his feet, wrap his hands around Ra’s windpipe and watch the life drain from his eyes.

There are too many people in the room. All attacking Ra’s will do is earn him is a severe amount of pain. Lashes with a whip, most likely. Oliver suspects that Ra’s has figured out that being flogged takes him back to the first time, makes the world fold in on itself over and over, makes _Oliver_ fold in on himself again and again.

That’s not something he can afford right now. He needs to be smart. It’s what Felicity would tell him to do.

Ra’s places a bow and a single arrow in his hands. “This is the only weapon you will get,” he says. “Do your job well, and you will be rewarded. Do it poorly, and you will be punished severely.”

Oliver’s handler is a woman the league calls _al-Janāḥ_. Oliver studies her as she converses with Ra’s, answering him in short, quiet sentences. Their conversation is almost entirely spoken in Korean, except for a few instances of Arabic, when he uses the name the league has given her. Oliver guesses she’s about a good three inches shorter than Felicity, but also that she could snap his neck like a twig.

“You will call me _al-Janāḥ_ ,” she tells Oliver in English as they leave the room. “I will not hear the name given to me by my people spoken from your clumsy tongue.” 

She is Oliver’s only escort to Bialya. Without making a sound, she sits with him on the plane. She touches her fingers to his wrist to get his attention or to get him to follow her, or to be quiet. They check into a seedy hotel, and she passes him a picture of a man. As Oliver studies it, _al-Janāḥ_ draws a circle around the man’s face with her forefinger, and then draws a line through the circle.

She doesn’t have to clarify her meaning. Oliver knows.

He doesn’t recognize his mark. He can’t say if he’s a good man or a bad man, and he suspects that’s by design. For all Oliver knows, Ra’s picked a target at random just to make sure that Oliver would comply with the League’s demands.

Killing the man means more blood on Oliver’s hands. Killing the man means Felicity and Tommy—and Thea and Diggle and all of them—will be safe for a while longer. Killing this man means that Nyssa’s plan will have time to work. Killing this man buys Oliver time.

Refusing will lead to pain. They won’t kill Oliver, or if they do, it won’t last long. Refusing will lead to pain for Felicity, pain for Tommy. Oliver’s seen how the League steals loyalty from its members. Most come to the organization as a last resort. Others are forcibly dragged into the life and broken once inside. If Oliver’s attachments get in his way, the League will remove them. Or worse. They’ll try to make Oliver do it himself.

Oliver is given a brief break to shower, and when he steps out of the bathroom there’s a black hood waiting for him.

“No,” Oliver says.

“Yes,” _al-Janāḥ_ says, holding it out to him. “You will comply.”

And Oliver does, ignoring thoughts of Malcolm as he puts the heavy black garment on one piece at a time.

_Al-Janāḥ_ leads him to his perch on a rooftop overlooking one of the markets. She waits there with him for the target to show.

Oliver sees him before _al-Janāḥ_ does. He also sees two more men in suits and sunglasses following him around from a safe distance. Bodyguards. Getting out of here might be tough.

There might be an opportunity to slip away. He might be able to contact Felicity, tell her that he’s alive.

Maybe. If he does this right.

He can feel _al-Janāḥ’s_ gaze on him as he places the nock of the arrow against the string of his bow.

“Make your choice,” _al-Janāḥ_ says, in perfect, accentless English. “The life of a man you will never know for the continued safety of the woman Oliver Queen called wife.”

For a moment, Oliver thinks of Hong Kong, when his rifle was trained on Tommy. There was that moment when Tommy turned so Oliver could recognize him. There was a moment when Oliver’s heart stopped, when all he could think of was how he’d turn the gun on himself rather than hurt Tommy.

But this isn’t Hong Kong. He’s not aiming at Tommy.

Oliver lets the arrow fly. He closes his eyes as soon as he lets go, doesn’t wait to see the killing strike. His brain can fill in the pieces. The man eyeing a piece of fruit picked up from a vendor’s stall when suddenly the shaft of Oliver’s arrow is through his neck, blood dripping down onto his shirt. The shrieks of the people around him.

_Al-Janāḥ_ doesn’t say a word, but she presses the tips of her fingers to the back of Oliver’s hand. So he follows her down the building’s fire escape—and right into one of the bodyguards.

Oliver doesn’t hesitate. He disarms the body guard with a quick motion, and sends him flying toward _al-Janāḥ_.

There’s a brief, fleeting moment when she’s distracted… when Oliver thinks if he can just get away from her, if he can just contact home, if he can just warn Tommy, warn Diggle, warn Felicity, that maybe he can get out of this. Maybe the League can’t aim him like a weapon and used him for their own ends.

Maybe if he’s quick, he can be free.

So as _al-Janāḥ_ ’s knee connects with the bodyguard’s chin, Oliver runs.

Distantly, he’s aware of the _crack_ as _al-Janāḥ_ snaps the assailant's neck. He turns just enough to see the body hit the ground and _al-Janāḥ_ turn her attention onto him.

There’s a glint of silver in her hand, but Oliver ignores it in favor of running to duck around a corner. That’s a mistake.

The flash that caught his eye was one of _al-Janāḥ_ ’s throwing knives. It’s when a bolt of pain ricochets through his shoulder that the reality of the situation hits. He slows, stumbling.

And _al-Janāḥ_ jumps onto his back.

She’s little, and under most circumstances, Oliver could shake her off, but she has a piano wire snugly wrapped around his neck. _al-Janāḥ_ pulls tight, and Oliver struggles for air. He tries to get a finger between the wire and his throat, but it’s impossible.

“Yield,” _al-Janāḥ_ says harshly. “And I will not speak of this to Ra’s.”

There is no choice to make. So Oliver yields.

Back at the hotel, _al-Janāḥ_ patches up his shoulder. They leave for Nanda Parbat the next day.

And just like that, Oliver is thrown back into his cell. He has only a half-hour to wait, pacing back and forth within the short width of the room.

He doesn’t know whether the men who come to get him are Nyssa’s or Ra’s’ until he arrives at the training room he normally meets Nyssa in.

As soon as Oliver is inside, everyone leaves the room. He stands still in the middle of the training mats, his hands behind his back.

Nyssa enters a few minutes later. Unlike most of their sparring sessions, where she’s stripped away the heavy league robes, she’s dressed in her full league armor. Her hand rests on the hilt of the sword belted to her waist.

Nyssa looks horrible, and Oliver hadn’t even known _horrible_ could be a word that would ever describe the appearance of the Daughter of the Demon. But her hair is disheveled, there are bags under her eyes, and she looks lost in a way that Oliver has never seen before.

“He’s taken her,” Nyssa says without preamble. “My father has taken Sara.”

Oliver’s stomach hits the floor. “Why?” he asks. She was supposed to be safe until Nyssa’s plan to replace her father could be carried out.

“I do not know,” Nyssa snaps. “But I do know that I intend to get her back.”

“You don’t have any allies in this,” Oliver tells her, knowing very well that she can’t directly order anyone within the League to go against her father’s wishes, and that most of the men she trusts don’t know her full plan for Oliver or why she’s taking the time to train him. “How do you plan on doing that?”

“I am more than capable of—”

“By yourself,” Oliver clarifies. “You can’t do this by yourself. You need help. You need—”

He stops. He knows exactly what she needs. He knows _who_ she needs. “Felicity,” he says. “You need Felicity. She can find Sara for you.”

Nyssa’s eyes narrow. “I will _not_ risk everything by telling your people you are alive. They will storm in here and they will die in the process.”

“You underestimate them,” Oliver argues. “But you don’t have to tell them about me. They’re Sara’s people too. They’ll help you find her.”

“You place too much faith in your friends,” Nyssa says.

“And you don’t place _enough_ ,” Oliver counters. “Who do you have who will stand by your side through anything?”

Her eyes burn with anger. “Sara.”

“So go do whatever it takes to get her back,” Oliver says.

* * *

It’s a full week before Oliver sees Nyssa again. He spends his time bending to Ra’s’ every whim and training with _al-Janāḥ_. When he does finally get escorted into her presence, she’s standing with her back to him.

“Oliver,” another female voice says from somewhere off to his left.

He turns, and Sara doesn’t exactly run to him, but it’s a near thing. Relief floods him as he catches her in his arms, turning his head to press a kiss to her hair. She’s shaking as she pulls away, pressing her hands to the shaggy, scratchy beard that has grown over the past year. Her fingertips skim across his cheek, down his jawline. Her touch makes him feel as close to home as he’s ever felt during this past year. “You’re really here. Felicity—”

“Felicity?” he asks. Her name on his tongue makes his heart hurt. “Tommy?” Another pang of hope and loss echoes in his chest. “Thea? Are they all alright? Dig? Roy?”

“Everybody’s safe,” Sara promises. “Everyone but you.”

“Felicity,” he says again, “Does she—”

“Felicity can’t know you’re alive,” Nyssa breaks in. “Not yet.”

Sara turns in Oliver’s arms. “Nyssa, she’s his…”

She doesn’t say wife. Instead she finishes the sentence with, “Beloved.”

“And we are still preparing to overthrow my father.” If she was telling Oliver, Nyssa’s tone would be much more confident, much more authoritative. With Sara, it sounds gentle, patient. Like buried underneath every word is a pledge of Nyssa’s love for her. That’s something Oliver can understand. “We cannot add more complications to this, Sara. You _cannot_ tell her.”

“I already told her there’s a chance, Nyssa.” Sara breaks away from Oliver, but he keeps a hand on her shoulder as she moves to Nyssa. “I told her my suspicious. I told her I was going to look for him. I have to tell her that… she deserves to _know_.”

Sara turns to Oliver. And damn, he’s missed her. He’s missed her strength, her friendship, her loyalty. Sara Lance will stay in his corner until the day one of them dies. He knows because it’s already happened. “She’s looking for you. So much has changed, but she still—”

“Sara.” Nyssa says sharply, and her voice holds a warning Oliver doesn’t understand. “As soon as my father is dead, Oliver is free to go home.”

“And before then? I just lie to Felicity? To—” A quick glance at Oliver, and Sara suddenly stops herself.

A slithery, uncomfortable feeling worms its way up Oliver’s neck. There’s something he’s not seeing, not understanding. He’s used to that from Nyssa, but not necessarily from Sara.

“There are things, _Ta-er al-Sahfer_ , that I cannot risk.” Nyssa turns to Oliver. “Just a while longer. To make this a success. Give me just a little more time.”

Sara looks at Oliver. “It’s your family.”

He wants Felicity to know. He knows his death hurt her, and he doesn’t want her to feel that pain for another _second_. But Nyssa also has a point. Felicity would march into hell—or Nanda Parbat—for him.

“How long?” he asks Nyssa.

“Four weeks,” she says. “Four weeks, and you can challenge my father. I will have people in place to secure my ascent as Ra’s al Ghul.” Nyssa turns to Sara and takes her hands. “We can be together, without my father’s insane rules or requirements or desires. He can’t control us anymore.”

Nyssa steps past Sara to Oliver. “Four weeks, and you can go home to your family. I give you my word.”

_And what is that worth to me?_ he thinks. Oliver looks at Sara. He wants to ask her where she’s been, what Ra’s has done to her, but just those thoughts are enough to remind him that Ra’s needs to be eliminated.

“Four weeks,” he says, and even though he can tell Sara doesn’t like it, she nods along with him. “And then I am going home to my _wife_.”

* * *

 

Oliver has four distinct memories of being on his knees. In the first, it’s dark. The grass and ground is cold through his slacks. He’s thrown himself between Ivo and Sara. Shado is shot—gone—and Oliver falls, numb.

In the second, Slade runs a sword through his mother’s chest, and again Oliver falls.

In the fourth, Oliver kneels before Ra’s, blood spilling from his lips, cold snow wet against his knees, the world fading away from him… He falls, but he doesn’t hit the ground.

But in-between, between Moira and Ra’s, between one death and another, Oliver remembers sunlight streaming through the windows of his bedroom, Felicity’s thighs resting over his shoulders. If he tries, he can practically feel the way she shivers if he runs his nails up her leg, or scrapes his teeth against her skin.

He can remember that moment, the sounds she made, the way she moved, the feel of her hands cupping the back of his neck as her heels pressed against his back.

It’s an intimate moment that Oliver clings to in moments of fear and distress. It’s an attempt to overwrite the pain he feels every time Ra’s men force him to his knees.

But it’s not the only memory in his arsenal.

There’s another. A night with the switch flipped ‘off’ on Oliver’s on-again-off-again relationship with Laurel. He was pissed at Robert. Tommy was pissed with Malcolm. Alcohol was involved. Most of the memories of the night were rather hazy, but specific moments stayed with Oliver.

There was a girl at a bar who asked him if he and Tommy were together. Tommy slung an arm around Oliver’s neck and laughed. “He couldn’t handle me.”

It wasn’t very long afterward that they took a couple of bottles back to their hotel room.

“You think so?” Oliver said to Tommy. “You think I couldn’t handle you.”

Tommy stuck his chin up. “Damn straight. I am a killer. Lethal. Too much damage for a soft soul like you.” He laughed, long and hollow. “Lost, wandering soul. I’m practically a Shakespearean tragedy. Hamlet. Macbeth, some shit like that.”

He gestured to Oliver with the Vodka bottle. “I’d destroy you. You’d destroy me. We’d combust. Mutually assured fucking destruction.”

“Destruction?” Oliver hadn’t believed it to be that bleak. They were friends, after all. Brothers, even. There’s no way on earth that they could destroy each other. Oliver didn’t think it was _possible_.

Tommy laughed again. “ _Fucking_ destruction.”

Something about that rankled Oliver a bit. It pushed at him, so Oliver pushed back.

He cupped a hand behind Tommy’s neck, stepped in, and kissed him _hard_.

Or rather, it was supposed to be hard. It was supposed to be wild and brutal and a thing that they laughed about in the morning.

Instead, two minutes later between gasping breaths, slowly roaming hands, and the feel of his body pressing Tommy’s into the mattress, the kiss was definitely something memorable, but _hard_ wasn’t the word to describe it. Not when they both were moving so carefully, taking their time, losing rational thought in favor of rapidly consuming desire.

Until finally, Oliver rolled over onto his back. His head was spinning, and it wasn’t the alcohol. But he’d never been good at facing down uncertainty, so he stretched his arms above his head and crossed his feet at the ankles.

He had a quip, something like, “I think I’m the one you couldn’t handle,” but it dropped away as soon as Tommy spoke.

“So that’s what that’s like,” he said.

The memory fades out after that. It’s dulled by time and alcohol. It’s not something they really discussed after the fact, despite Oliver’s plan to laugh it off the next morning.

But Oliver’s never denied it either. It’s an easy memory to get lost in, because for Oliver it’s always held an unanswered question. Namely, what would have happened if they hadn’t stopped?

He doesn’t have an answer. He’s not looking for one.

What he is looking for is an escape from this hell. And remembering those few moments of touching Tommy in a way Oliver’s never wanted to touch any other man before, those are enough to take his mind off of hell for a little while.

Those are the two people in his thoughts on the morning Oliver goes to challenge Ra’s.

Felicity and Tommy.

He’s thrown onto his knees, wincing against the pain, forced into stillness by the blade pressed to his throat. The man holding it asks Ra’s al Ghul, “Shall I dispose of him?”

“No,” Ra’s says. “The boy wants a fight? The boy will learn to consider his requests more carefully.”

And then, in Arabic, “I shall teach this dog the meaning of suffering before he dies.”

* * *

 

Every so often the wind picks up in a mighty gust that pierces like needles through Oliver’s skin. It tosses flakes of snow around the assembly that has gathered. Nyssa. Sara. Several other league members.

Oliver can’t look at Sara right now. He can’t think about what it is she represents. He _can’t_ if he’s going to survive what is about to happen next.

Ra’s al Ghul is speaking, but Oliver doesn’t care what he’s saying. He readjusts his grip on his chosen sword, feels the weight of it.

He is better now. He can do this now. He will not fail a second time.

There is no coming back if he fails a second time.

“You choose to use the weapon that has defeated you,” Ra’s says, as Nyssa steps forward to remove her father’s cloak.

Oliver chooses not to dignify the taunt with a response. Ra’s is annoyed, clearly feeling these proceedings are beneath him. He was interested when he had yet to face the boy trying to save his sister, but now Oliver is a pest. Ra’s has made it clear that he’s merely humoring him for the sake of appearances.

The differences between this fight and the last are immediately apparent. Ra’s wastes no time waiting for Oliver to attack. He goes on the offensive immediately, sending Oliver scrambling back, his footing lost in the sudden need to keep from losing this fight before it’s even really begun.

He can hear Nyssa’s instructions in his head as they duel, hear her voice telling him to wait for weakness, look for an opening, draw attention elsewhere and then strike.

The cold makes everything numb. His fingers don’t want to grip the hilt of his sword anymore. His legs don’t want to move. His lungs don’t want to _breathe_. Failing to dodge Ra’s’ sword adequately leaves blood dripping down his arm.

But Oliver wants to survive. Oliver wants to go _home_. That’s kept him alive up until now. He just needs it to keep him alive a little bit longer.

The longer the fight goes on, the more frantic Ra’s becomes to end it. Oliver escapes a killing blow by the skin of his teeth, falling back against a stone pillar and twisting away from a deadly swipe of the Demon's blade.

Ra’s stands, arm outstretched, the tip of his sword inches from Oliver’s nose.

_It’s almost over_.

Oliver strikes. He clamps his hand down around Ra’s’ wrist and twists. His opponent's sword falls to the snow as Oliver uses a pressure point to force the man down to his knees.

Oliver kicks the weapon away and thrusts his sword deeply into the Demon's chest. Blood bubbles out of Ra’s’ mouth.

_Diggle’s handshake; Roy’s downturned lips; his last glimpse of Sara standing at the edge of the duelling ground; Thea crying against his chest; Tommy hugging him goodbye; Felicity holding his wedding ring in her hands._

When Oliver quickly draws the sword out of Ra’s chest, he thinks of Ra’s’ words over him at his own death, thinks of _forgiveness_ and _mercy_ shown to Ra’s soul.

The man stole a year of his life. Oliver would much rather Ra’s soul burn in hell. He stays quiet, solemn, and waits for the demon to die.

When Ra’s body falls over into the snow, Oliver stoops over him. He unclenches the man’s fist and pulls off the Demon’s ring—the signet ring of the leader of the League of Assassins.

Then he turns to the spectators. Taking a few steps in their direction, Oliver turns the bloody sword over in his hands and offers it, hilt first, to Nyssa.

There’s no emotion on her face as she takes it from him, cleans it with steady hands, and slides it into its sheath. Next, he holds out Ra’s al Ghul’s ring and drops it into her palm.

And then he takes a knee before the Demon’s Head.

“Your debt to the league is paid,” Nyssa tells him. “Go home, Oliver Queen.”

Oliver exhales sharply, the bitter cold turning the breath visible. He thinks about the way sunshine catches in Felicity’s curls and the gold wedding ring he asked her to keep safe. Every part of his body aches. It’s hard to keep himself upright through his exhaustion.

It’s over.

“Thank you,” he says.

* * *

**END OF PART TWO**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Probably going to skip next week, due to Thanksgiving in the States, so look for an update on December 1st.


	17. PART THREE: CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver returns. Things are revealed. Everyone copes in their own way.

Oliver comes back from the dead with an injury. It’s just a gash on his forearm, but it means that Felicity and Tommy both come rushing into the Arrowcave to find Diggle patching him up.

It also means that Oliver is shirtless, sitting on the edge of one of the metal tables with a grimace of pain on his face. John backs away as Felicity and Tommy approach.

It takes Felicity _seconds_ to start categorizing the new scars. She runs her eyes over Oliver’s chest, his arms, wonders about the ones that are surely on his back.

When his eyes meet hers, her breath catches in her throat. She gasps. Her hand covers her mouth. She watches as his lips mouth her name while she slowly moves toward him. Tommy is a few paces behind her, and while his hand _was_ on the small of her back, he drops it when she starts to walk away.

She’s only a few steps away when Oliver reaches for her. His fingers wrap around her forearm even as she moves closer, closer.

Felicity’s eyes burn with tears. Slowly, she cups Oliver’s face with her hands. He closes his eyes at her touch, leans in. With the height of the table, she can press him close to her chest, rest her chin on his head. She cradles her hand against the back of his neck, the other rests on his shoulder. She can feel his arms around her, tight and solid and real around her waist.

She thought she’d never get to hold him again.

“I’m sorry I left you,” he rasps. His voice causes a fresh wave of tears to spring to her eyes. “I’m sorry, Felicity. I—”

“You came back,” she tells him, tracing her fingers down his spine. There’s what looks like a brand—like cattle, they branded her husband like he was their fucking _property_ —of an Arrow on his right shoulder. “You came back to me.”

“I said I would,” Oliver says, keeping his arms tightly about her. “I promised you.”

She pulls back slightly, kisses his forehead, rubs her thumbs across his temples.

One of Oliver’s arms leaves her waist. She feels the warmth of it leave her back, and she turns her head to see him holding out his hand to—

Tommy.

Tommy—who Felicity is sure both of them can tell is forcing his smile, whose eyes are sad—takes it.

And then Tommy has one arm around Oliver’s shoulders and one arm around Felicity’s back, and all Felicity can do is _cry_. They’re here. They’re both wrapped around her. Everything is wrong.

Everything is right.

It’s a perfect moment that can’t last, but Felicity savors it every second that she can.

Tommy is the one who pulls away first. Almost bashfully, he wipes at his eyes with the sleeves of his Henley.

“I’m going to give you a minute,” Tommy says quietly, looking from Oliver to Felicity. “You have a lot to talk about.”

“Tommy…” Felicity starts to say, but he shakes his head.

“Take all the time you need,” he says. The hand that’s still on her shoulder gives it a reassuring squeeze.

Felicity’s not a stranger to fear. She was scared when Slade grabbed her, and that didn’t stop her from stabbing him in the neck with the Mirakuru cure. She was scared when the foundry was crumbling around her, and she still stayed and manned the comms. She’s not a stranger to fear; she’s not a stranger to doing what needs to be done despite her fear.

Nothing scares her the way the thought of losing people does.

And she just got Oliver back. He is _here_ , right here. She can trace her finger over the healed scar where Ra’s stabbed him.

They’re alone, just the two of them, and they haven’t been alone together in at least a year.

And for just a moment, Felicity wants to wish away all the complications. She wants this moment to have happened a year ago, before Tommy, before she cradled her broken heart in her hands and let someone help her heal the cracks.

She just wishes everything were _simple_. That Oliver had come back right away, that he’d killed Ra’s, that he’d never gone to duel the man in the first place, that Malcolm Merlyn had stayed the hell out of their lives.

The guilt kicks in a second later. There are things that it’s simply unfair of her to regret. Tommy is one of them. Oliver’s love for his sister is another. Losing Oliver brought an unimaginable pain; finding Tommy brought incomprehensible joy. The two things are so intertwined it’s almost unfair, but Felicity is _good_ at taking complex things apart.

So maybe, somehow, she can figure out a way to put these two crucial pieces of her life together.

She takes Oliver’s hand and a deep breath. “There’s something I have to tell you. Something that happened while you were away.”

He looks at her like he’s braced for impact.

“I got married.”

* * *

 

Oliver really ought to have learned his lesson: There is no escape from hell. If the afterlife is really comprised of nine circles, he must have made it through at least four by now. He thought the third was the worst, but the fourth is proving to be surprisingly agonizing.

“Please say something,” Felicity whispers.

Oliver’s been physically stabbed in the chest and it doesn’t compare to this pain. “Who?”

It doesn’t matter. It _shouldn’t_ matter. She moved on. She lived. She _loved_. That’s what should matter. But the fact is that he’s fallen asleep every night for the past year with her name being the last thought in his head. It’s tough reconciling that with the revelation that at the same time Felicity was at home, in bed, safe, with someone else…

He stops that thought. Felicity was _home_. Felicity was _safe_. Felicity had someone looking out for her. He’s spent enough time alone that he wouldn’t wish it on her.

Felicity’s trembling slightly, wringing her hands together, every inch of her body screaming unease and discomfort and apprehension.

“Who?” he asks again, carefully setting a hand on her shoulder. He speaks softly, slowly. “You can tell me.”

“Tommy,” she says, soft as a whisper, and Oliver’s stomach plummets into his feet.

“My Tommy?” he asks, using the hand not on her shoulder to brush her hair out of her eyes.

She nods, tears dripping down her cheeks. Oliver wipes them away with the backs of his fingers. It feels like something inside him is breaking. There’s a war of _how could he?_ and _how could she?_ being fought inside him.

It didn’t feel like this with Laurel. But he had returned to Laurel knowing she would be angry. He had returned knowing that he’d betrayed her, that her sister was dead because of him. He had returned with a tiny scrap of hope, but nothing more.

He expected to come back to Felicity. He expected a transition and a shock but not… not that she’d remarried. Not that she’d fallen for someone else. Not that she’d married _Tommy._

He doesn’t know how to process that. He doesn’t know if he’s hurt or angry or betrayed or just deeply sorrowful.

He feels very, very tired. Exhausted, almost to the bone. He shuts his eyes and lets the world around him drop away too. Except Felicity’s hands are now running through his hair softly. The touch conjures up memories of her doing it before: lazy sunday mornings with his head in her lap, late nights when satisfaction and exhaustion dragged him down into sleep.

It feels wrong to let her soothe him like this; it feels greedy to take comfort from her. He just doesn’t want to stop. He’s been stabbed and hit and shot at and thrown. He’s slept on hard floors and gone nights without sleep. He’s bled and bruised and patched himself back together. His hands have broken bones and snapped necks. This moment—right here, where he can smell Felicity’s perfume and feel her fingers against his scalp and wrap his arms around her waist—this is the moment he’s longed for during all of that. This is a cup of water given to a man dying of thirst.

And still, he says, “You should go back to your husband.”

She puts her hands on his arms; he feels her nails against his skin as she tightens her grip, like she’s going to lose him at any second. “My husband’s right here.”

“Not _me_ , Felicity. _Him._ ”

Her face crumbles, and he feels even worse. “Why are the both of you so eager to just give me up? What the hell is wrong with me that neither of you thinks I’m worth fighting for?”

“It’s not— _fuck_ —Felicity, it’s not that.” He pulls her in close to him, letting her press her cheek against his shoulder. “It’s not that we don’t want to fight for _you_. It’s that we don’t want to fight each other. I would go to _war_ for you. But you love him and I love—”

He swallows, his voice thick, emotion heavy in his chest. “—you,” he settles on. “I love both of you.”

“I love both of you,” she repeats. “Just because I love him doesn’t mean I love you less or missed you less or—” she chokes on a sob. “ _Oliver_.”

He says her name back. Because that’s always how they’ve told the other they are loved.

She leans back, wipes her tears away again. “Tell me what you need, Oliver.”

“You,” he says.

“Okay,” she tells him. Taking his hand, Felicity leads him away from the medical section of the lair. He’s never been in this version before, but he recognizes things here and there. He follows her to the twin bed she bought him. He sits gingerly on the edge of the mattress while Felicity draws the privacy curtains closed around them.

He lets her coax him into lying down, and he lets out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding when she curls up beside him. She draws her fingers across his forehead, and he’s helpless to do anything but close his eyes and savor her touch. Scooting closer, Felicity embraces him easily. One of her legs slides between his; one of her hands presses over his heart. Oliver knows just what to do next. Sliding an arm beneath her, he rolls over onto his back, taking her with him. He feels her sigh and snuggle in closer, feels her leave a kiss on his shoulder.

After a moment, he loses the fight against sleep.

* * *

Felicity wakes up feeling trapped, with nowhere to go. Oliver’s here; Tommy’s at home. There’s no escape from the heartbreakingly insane situation that is her life.

Oliver’s sleeping so soundly that he only stirs a little when she slips out of his arms. He must be truly exhausted. It’s rare for him to not sense her wake every morning.

The foundry is freezing, but Oliver’s old sweater—her usual go-to when she’s shivering down here—is right where she left it a week ago. She slides her arms through the sleeves and rolls them up a bit. Then she makes sure Oliver’s covered with a blanket.

Her purse is still on her desk, where she usually sets it, and she rummages through it until she finds her phone. Out of habit, she checks her emails and peeks in on the vigilante related scans she always has running.

Then she texts Tommy. _Still here. Everything is_ …

Hesitation pulls at her, but eventually she types out, _Everything is all right_.

There’s nothing that requires her immediate attention, but one of her voicemails is from Thea, who is on her way back from Central City and should be arriving in a few hours. She knows Oliver asked about Thea only a few moments after asking about her.

They have a coffeemaker down here now, so she starts brewing a pot. She rummages around in one of her desk drawers for a box of granola bars. Leaving one beside the bed for Oliver, in case he wakes up hungry and she isn’t there, she unwraps her own and takes a bite.

The computers hum. Felicity settles back in her chair. She chews on her granola. Her head still aches from crying the night before, but just the thought of her current situation makes fresh tears spring to her eyes.

She doesn’t know what to do. And Felicity’s not used to not knowing what to do. She’s a problem solver. A solution-maker. She figures out answers where there are none.

There are no solutions here. She can see it all laid out in front of her, like a map. Two roads diverging, but both end the same.

She chooses Tommy. She loses Oliver. Either she begins to resent Tommy being her choice or he starts wondering that she does.

It goes the other way around if she chooses Oliver.

Either way she ends up alone. She breaks her heart one way or the other, but either way her heart still breaks. She still loses something valuable. Something irreplaceable.

She hears the coffee finish brewing and stands up to pour herself a cup. She hears the dip of the mattress and the slide of the curtain as Oliver comes out, tugging a gray t-shirt over his head. His hair is tousled, slightly longer than he used to wear it.

Felicity pulls out another mug. After she fills both cups, she has to stop herself from adding the cream Tommy usually likes to Oliver’s mug.

She feels more than hears Oliver come up behind her. His hands cover her shoulders, slide down her arms. Felicity’s breath catches in her throat. Feeling helpless to do anything else, she leans back into his touch.

“What do you want to do?” he murmurs.

“I don’t know,” she answers, turning around. “Where have you been, Oliver? What have you been doing? Why didn’t—”

She leaves that question hanging in midair. _Why didn’t you come back?_

For a moment, Oliver is quiet, and she thinks he’s not going to answer her. She’s almost certain of it, but then he speaks.

“I was with the League,” he says.

“For twelve months?”

“I tried…” She hears the catch in his voice; he can’t look at her. “I tried _everything_.”

“What were you doing?” she whispers, scared of the answer.

He doesn’t want to tell her; she knows this, so she’s not at all surprised when all he says is, “Surviving.”

She presses her lips together. She’ll let him have his secrets. For a little while. She’ll just have to be there when they catch up to him, when finally he realizes that he can’t carry them alone anymore. Knowing Oliver, that’ll be when he literally can’t take another step.

Her purse is on the desk where she left it, and she reaches for it. It only takes a few moments to find what the velvet ring box. It feels heavy in her hands as she opens it and takes out Oliver’s gold band. She leaves her ring inside.

When she moves back to Oliver, he’s watching her with an odd mix of longing and curiosity on his face.

Taking his left hand in both of hers, Felicity slides his wedding ring onto his finger slowly. When it’s back where it belongs, she lifts his palm to her lips and presses a kiss to his lifeline.

“I kept it safe,” she tells him. Her chest aches with an all-too-familiar grief, but it’s milder than it was when she lost him. Or maybe it’s just the same weight as it’s always been, and she’s just grown so used to carrying it that it takes less effort now.

“I know you did,” Oliver says.

He kisses her forehead and runs his hand from her shoulder to her wrist, the same way he did when he said goodbye.

She closes her eyes and promises herself that this is a hello. This has to be a hello. Her heart can’t take another goodbye.

The door at the top of the stairs opens. Felicity doesn’t have to look to know that it’s Tommy coming down the stairs. Thea wouldn’t have gotten back so soon.

Anxiety churns in her stomach at the thought of what might happen next. Turning away from Oliver, she pulls out another mug while Tommy walks over. Out of habit, Felicity pours the coffee, adds just the right amount of cream, and stirs.

The two men greet each other with a nod that feels terribly uncomfortable considering Felicity’s seen them hug like they never want to let the other go.

“Felicity,” Tommy says carefully. “Can Oliver and I talk?”

She looks between them. “Yes,” she says. “Of course.”

The thought of leaving them tears her up inside, but the two of them are owed this. She can give them this. It scares the hell out of her, but she loves them so she’ll do it.

She moves to Oliver first, putting a hand on his shoulder and leaning up to kiss his cheek. He turns his head—whether out of instinct, habit, or longing, Felicity isn’t sure—and her lips meet his instead.

It’s sweet and simple, and Felicity closes her eyes and lets it linger.

Apprehensively, she turns to Tommy. She’s not sure what she was expecting, but his eyes are soft and thoughtful. She kisses him next. On the lips, just like Oliver. Slow and sweet, just like how she’d kissed Oliver.

When she steps away from both of them, she feels a little breathless. Her heart beating a little quicker than it was before.

“Please,” she says, glancing from one to the other, “Don’t… hurt each other.” She doesn’t mean physically.

She waits for them to both nod before she leaves.

* * *

 

Oliver being alive is a dream come true wrapped up in a living nightmare. Tommy doesn’t bother trying to sleep the night Oliver returns. He doesn’t stay awake to make sure Felicity gets home safe. Felicity’s not coming home. Not that night. Not when Oliver’s been dead for twelve months.

He doesn’t blame her. He’d expected as much when he left.

He’s vowed not to think too hard about what Oliver and Felicity could be saying or doing. Whatever it is, right now it’s between them. That’s alright. It has to be alright.

It’s not jealousy that’s eating at him. He knows what jealousy feels like, the sick, twisted churning in his gut.

This isn’t jealousy. It’s anxiety, certainly. Their situation is precarious. One wrong action, one wrong word, and they could all inflict terrible damage on each other. They know the other’s weak spots. They _are_ each other’s weak spots.

It had taken a lot for him to leave Felicity there alone, not knowing how Oliver would react.

In a strange way, he wants to protect her from this. It’s impossible to shield her from this kind of pain. It’s not physical and it cuts deep. That it’s an impossibility doesn’t stop the wanting.

At the same time, Tommy knows what needs to happen next. Felicity’s had her talk with Oliver. Now it’s his turn.

He just wishes he was a little more certain about what Oliver’s reaction is going to be.

Oliver and Felicity are standing closely together as Tommy makes his way down the stairs. Felicity’s attention is on the mug of coffee she’s pouring; Oliver’s attention is on Felicity.

It’s almost strange, seeing them so near and so far away from each other. He hasn’t seen tension between them like this since before they started dating, since he had to help Oliver get out of his own way. Tommy’s excellent at reading Felicity by now, and he’s always been good at picking up Oliver’s body language. Everything about them is sorrowful and tense, and Tommy wonders what conversation he likely interrupted when he opened the door.

When Felicity kisses Oliver goodbye, Tommy expects something inside him to crumble into pieces.

It doesn’t. It’s not the end of the world or the final break in his heart. It doesn’t flood every fiber of his being with jealousy. It’s just Felicity kissing Oliver. He’s seen her do it hundreds of times before.

She kisses him then, and Tommy can’t help resting his hand on her waist. It’s hard to resist the urge to wrap his arms more fully around her, but the knowledge that Oliver’s standing only a few feet away— watching them—is inescapable.

Felicity leaves, and to Tommy it feels like all the air and warmth in the room goes with her.

The two of them look at each other. Tommy doesn’t know if he should start with an apology, an explanation, or just wait for Oliver to say something.

But all he can think about is standing at Oliver’s grave _again_. Having a new date to etched into an old headstone. The unfairness of getting his best friend back only to lose him again.

And Tommy forgets everything he thought he _should_ say.

“Look, Oliver. I know everything is screwed up, but for five minutes can I just…” Tommy purses his lips and blows out a steady stream of air. “Can I be your best friend and not just the guy your wife remarried?”

All the tension seeps out of Oliver slowly. “I don’t think you could ever be just that.”

Oliver’s hug is long and easy. Tommy holds onto him tightly. Relief and joy and uncertainty are at war inside him, and he can’t help but think Oliver must be feeling the same things. “Glad you’re alive,” he says. “You got to stop dying on me, man.”

“I’m not all that fond of it myself,” Oliver replies.

It’s over all too soon. There is, after all, a Felicity-themed elephant in the room.

They both fell in love with her. They both married her.

If this was fate, Tommy thinks, fate’s got a screwed up sense of humor, because this twist is downright cruel.

Neither of them look at each other as they back away. Tommy thinks Oliver’s about to say something, but he still has four more minutes, and he’s going to use them.

“How are you alive?” He knows what Sara said, but he wants to hear it from Oliver. He’s always wanted to hear it from Oliver. He never knew how to ask, about the island, about being the Arrow, about those five years. He’d been scared of rejection or of prying open Oliver’s wounds while he was healing, but he’s learned.

It’s better to ask. It’s better for Oliver to tell him _no_ , or _I can’t tell you yet_.

“Ra’s al Ghul has a…” he swallows, clears his throat, “...a _pit_. It can heal. It can bring back the dead. He—”

Tommy doesn’t need him to finish. “So you’ve just been, what?”

“In the league.” Oliver won’t look at him, which means he’s thinking about things he’d rather not dwell on. “Bringing me back put me in Ra’s debt. He wanted restitution.”

“How’d you get out?”

Oliver looks him right in the eye. It’s a challenge, but Tommy doesn’t back down. “I killed him.”

Maybe it’s because Tommy was there when Sara set down a bloody sword and Felicity cracked and crumbled apart, or maybe it’s because Tommy cracked and crumbled right along with her, or maybe it’s because five years in hell was enough but six is _excessive_ , but Tommy says, “Good.”

Oliver raises his eyebrows. “Good?”

“He took you away from me.” There’s no point in disguising the anger in his voice. “Away from _her_. Again. I hope you made it hurt.”

Three minutes left. “She looked for you. We both—”

“I know,” Oliver sighs deeply. “They kept me isolated. Ra’s knew what incentives to use to keep me from coming back or reaching out. I never saw Sara until the last day.”

_Thea_. It had to be Thea that Ra’s had threatened. Or Felicity. Tommy’s blood boils just thinking about it.

“I keep you safe; you keep them safe,” Oliver says. “That’s what we said once, remember?.”

It was, but Tommy hadn’t liked it even then.

“Who keeps you safe?” Tommy asks him, anger on Oliver’s behalf flooding through him. “You’ve deserved _none_ of this. This isn’t penance for your sins or punishment for your failures, Oliver. You’re not worth _less_ than any of us, just because there might be more blood on your hands.”

Oliver shakes his head. At his side, Tommy can see Oliver’s thumb rubbing against his middle finger. Still yearning for a bowstring.

“I would pay any price keep you safe. I don’t care about _fair_.”

One minute.

“It should have been me,” Tommy tells him. His voice cracks with emotion on the _me_. “I should have gone. It was Malcolm’s fault Thea was even in this situation.”

“She’s my sister,” Oliver says vehemently.

“Mine too,” Tommy fires back.

“I couldn’t—” Oliver stops, chest heaving, expression pained. “I couldn’t lose you.”

“I couldn’t _either_ ,” Tommy yells. “Neither could Thea, or Sara, or John, or Felicity. You’re fucking important to _all_ of us, Oliver.”

Drawing in a breath, Oliver presses the heels of his hands to his forehead, and turns away. Tommy catches the glint of his wedding ring in the light.

Felicity did return it. He’d thought she might have.

He tries to reassure himself that it doesn’t mean anything. The ring is Oliver’s, after all.

“How long?” Oliver asks, dropping his hands. “How long have you two been married?”

Five minutes are evidently up.

“Four months,” Tommy says. Oliver and Felicity were married five. He can see Oliver doing the math backwards in his head.

_Four,_ Oliver mouths thoughtfully. Tommy can’t tell if he expected more or less. “When did you ask her?”

The next words out of his mouth are going to wound Oliver, but Tommy can’t think of a way around them. “I didn’t. She asked me.”

Oliver closes his eyes, like that’s going to hold off the pain.

Tommy feels like everything is unraveling around them. All he can do is continue to throw painful truths at Oliver, and all Oliver can do is reflect them back at him.

Without thinking, Tommy reaches for Felicity’s chair and draws it toward him. The only sound in the room is the scrape of the wheels against the concrete. Tommy sits. Oliver starts to pace. He keeps Tommy at his back.

“I love her,” Tommy says helplessly, glancing down at the ring on his finger. “I do. And as happy as I’ve been with her, I’d go back and trade places with you in an instant if it meant she never had to go through the pain of losing you.”

Oliver stops moving. “I don’t know why I thought it would be better this time.”

“What would be?” Tommy asks, even though he doesn’t want to know.

“Coming home,” Oliver whispers. Tommy wishes he could see his face. “All the uncomfortable unfamiliar. All the right pieces put in the wrong order.”

_Wrong_.

Logic—of course Oliver would see the jumble of everyone’s evolved lives as wrong—takes a backseat to hurt. Tommy can’t help but think that he’s the one who’s wrong. Spending his nights putting on a black mask that shouldn’t belong to him. Spending his days loving a girl who doesn’t belong to him either.

“I’m sorry,” he says, though he doesn’t know what he’s apologizing for. Maybe everything.

“We just keep repeating the same old patterns,” Oliver says bitterly.

The words hit Tommy like a slap in the face. He means Laurel. There’s no mistaking that.

Life makes everything harder for Oliver Queen; life takes everything away from Tommy Merlyn.

The same old patterns indeed.

They’re both silent for a moment. Then Oliver grabs one of the coffee mugs from the table and throws it against the concrete wall with a loud yell of frustration. It shatters into pieces.

Tommy knows the feeling. Though he relates more to the mug.

Oliver crumples. His knees give as he drops to the floor, head in his hands. “You know what I can’t decide? If I hate that she got married or if I hate that it was you or if I hate that I haven’t learned by now it’s always better for everyone else if I stay dead.”

Tommy digs his nails into the armrests of Felicity’s chair. Abruptly, he stands up, sending the chair spinning off behind him. “It is _never_ better when you stay dead.”

Oliver closes his eyes. “I know.”

Tommy’s phone chimes. He glances down at the screen. “Thea just got here. I should give you two some time.”

Planting his palm on the floor, Oliver pushes himself to his feet. “Where will you go?”

Tommy shrugs a shoulder, takes Oliver’s sudden swerve into calmness as the request to put things behind them that it is. “Check on Felicity, probably. Make sure she’s okay. None of this is easy for her. I’m sure you… talked about that.”

“Yeah,” Oliver says roughly. “She’s the one I’m worried this will destroy.”

“She’s pretty tough,” Tommy tells him. “Found that out when she lost you.”

And then, because five minutes wasn’t long enough, Tommy hooks an arm around Oliver’s shoulders and pulls him in for another hug.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wish I could give you a date to expect an update, but I work in retail and December is INSANE. Hopefully I’ll sneak in another chapter this month, if not, you should get one in January.


	18. PART THREE: CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now that Oliver is home, readjustments need to be made.

It takes Oliver a few minutes to pull himself back together after Tommy leaves. Since everything in this lair is about the same place as the other one, he has no trouble finding the cleaning supplies, such as they are. He cleans the spilled coffee and sweeps up the broken glass.

There are more costumes in the lair now. He recognizes Roy’s Arsenal suit, Sara’s white leathers, Laurel’s black ones, the red suit Felicity bought Thea after they got her back from Malcolm, and the empty space for when Barry is in town, but he’s puzzled momentarily by the black leather hood. It looks eerily like his own green hood, with several aesthetic differences. There’s something _almost_ League-like in it’s design, but the mask that accompanies it is very close to the one Barry gave Oliver such a long time ago.

The door at the top of the stairs opens, and Oliver looks up with a smile. “Hey, sis.”

With a wide grin, Thea bounds down the stairs and throws her arms around his neck. “ _Oliver_.”

“I missed you so much,” he tells her.

“I am really tired of people telling me that you’re dead,” she says.

“Trust me,” Oliver says, “I’m really tired of being dead.”

Thea steps back. There are tears in her eyes as she looks up at him. “Seriously, Ollie. This is no fun at all.”

“I know, Speedy.” He can’t help the way his voice cracks. Her hair is even shorter, wavy, a slightly lighter color. She’s dyed it.

Unable to help himself, he touches the strands, then puts his fingers to her temple. “You putting on a mask these days?”

She walks past him, nodding. They return to where Oliver was standing moments ago, looking up at the display of suits.

“Who’s in the black?” Oliver asks, gesturing to the mystery suit.

“Tommy,” Thea says. “I think vigilantism is the new therapy in this town. Or heroism is contagious. Depends on how cynical of a worldview you have.”

It’s Tommy’s. Oliver had suspected, when he saw the ease with which Tommy put on his father’s League gear in order to save Thea, when he heard how Tommy rushed into danger for her, when Tommy went with them to get her back in Corto Maltese.

“You can’t…” Thea looks down. “You can’t imagine how it was to lose you. It took… _so_ much work, and sweat, and blood, and tears, and _fighting_ to get us here. But we got here, Oliver. For _you_. For what you did for this city, for what you taught us how to do, for who you taught us to be.”

“I’m not qualified to teach anybody anything,” he says, numb.

“You lead by example,” she says. “You always have. We just wanted to carry on your legacy. Finish what you started. But we’re far from done.”

Oliver reaches over and takes her hand. He holds on tightly. “You’ve all always been the best of me,” he tells her.

“That’s not true,” Thea says. “It’s not true, Oliver, because so much of who we are is _because_ of you.”

“Or in spite of.” He must say it harsher than he means to, because Thea takes a step back.

Oliver sighs, disappointed in himself. He rubs the back of his neck. “I’m sorry, Thea. Maybe that’s a topic we should avoid for a while?”

She nods, still looking a little off balance.

“I’m starving,” Oliver says. “What do you say we go find some food?”

Now Thea smiles. “You’ve got it.”

They go to Big Belly Burger (which has taken Oliver’s favorite bacon jalapeno burger off of the menu; the waitress says she’ll see what she can do).

Thea sips on her milkshake and absently plays with her necklace. The pendant is a shiny silver arrowhead.

“So what have you been doing for the past year?” Oliver asks. “Please tell me you didn’t get married.”

A light blush sweeps across Thea’s cheeks. “No, I didn’t. I guess they told you.”

“Kind of a hard secret to keep.” Oliver hasn’t had a milkshake in forever. It tastes incredibly sweet. He pushes it a few more inches away from him. “So then what is it you’re not telling me, Speedy?”

“Roy and I are kinda… seeing someone.”

Something churns in Oliver’s stomach. It might be the greasy food. He should have ordered a salad. “You _and_ Roy are seeing someone?”

She gives him the exasperated look of someone who’s been a younger sibling all their life. “We’re both romantically interested in the same person, so the three of us are… dating.”

Confusion hits Oliver first, then understanding slowly sinks in.  “So the _three_ of you are… romantically involved?”

Thea sighs. “I wasn’t going to tell you, okay? We’re not really telling anyone yet. It’s… I guess you could call the situation untraditional.”

“What’s he—” Thea raises her eyebrows, and Oliver course corrects— “She?”

Thea nods, and Oliver finds himself mentally reevaluating a few assumptions he’s made about Thea. Then again, he was stranded on an island during her teenage years. Maybe it’s not entirely his fault he didn’t put a few things together sooner. “What’s she like?”

“Sin? She’s guarded,” Thea answers. “Tough. Which means she fits with us kinda well.”

Oliver returns his attention to his food.

“Just ask,” Thea says. “You’re thinking really loudly, so just _ask_. I’m not gonna get offended. You have every reason to be curious.”

She’s his baby sister. It’s weird to ask her questions like this, but Oliver also know’s that he’s _safe_ doing so. “How does that work?”

“I hold two hands at the movies. Uh, cuddling is twice as awesome. I kiss two people goodbye. I get two goodnight texts.” She ducks her head on a happy smile, and Oliver feels a deep sense of joy at the sight of her obvious happiness. It’s all he’s ever wanted for her. For a very long time he was worried she’d never get it.

“What?” Thea asks, when all he can do is look at her.

“I was just…” Oliver struggles with the words, with the vulnerability they require. “Remembering how worth dying for you are.”

Thea’s eyes fill with tears, but she looks down uncomfortably and clears her throat. “Yeah, well, next time I need dying for, let me do the dying.”

“Not gonna happen, Speedy,” he tells her. “I’m really glad to see you happy.”

“I am happy.” She pushes her french fries around on her plate. “I think now it’s your turn.”

“Thea…”

“Look,” Thea says, reaching across the table to place her hand on his wrist. “I know I’m not you and you’re not me, and your situation and mine are very different, but I don’t think I’m wrong in saying that you love them both. I know they both love you.”

“It’s different,” he says.

“Is it?” asks Thea. “Really? Because I don’t think it has to be.”

It’s an incredible thought, really. Tommy and Felicity. Tommy and him and Felicity. It eases the tightness in his chest and the pounding in his head. He thinks about what Thea said: two kisses good night, two hands to hold, two bodies wrapped around his.

It’s just too much to hope for.

* * *

 

After lunch, Thea drags him to the mall. “Because all the clothes Felicity didn’t throw away are _so_ old,” she tells him.

The clothes Felicity saved don’t fit quite right either. Oliver’s slimmed down a touch. They’re not baggy, per se, just loose in a few places.

They pick out some henleys, a few sweaters, some jeans and some slacks. Oliver glances at the men’s business section, but then he keeps walking. He remembers seeing his father always wearing a tie. Oliver always thought he was going to become like Robert, down to the constant suit and tie.

But Oliver’s suit is green. And it has a mask.

He and Thea fight over who is paying for his clothes, but since all the credit cards Oliver had in his name were canceled after his death, he’s not carrying any cash, and a check is equally out of the question, Thea doesn’t really have to argue so much as she just has to pass her plastic over to the saleswoman.

“You should stay at my place tonight,” Thea says, scribbling her name down on the cashier’s copy of her credit card receipt.

Oliver thinks about that as they head for the exit. It’s tempting. Thea has a guest room and a futon, but the lair has a comfortable twin bed. He can be alone.

Already the noise of the mall and the smells and sights are getting to him a bit. It’s not as bad as it was when he returned from Lian Yu the first time, but it’s still disorienting. The world twists around him, bending and refracting in ways that distort what Oliver knows is reality.

“I was at the wedding,” Thea says, as they head back down to the Arrowcave. “Tommy and Felicity’s wedding. It was really simple, but pretty. They were… _so_ happy.”

Oliver forces himself to stop rubbing his thumb and forefingers together. He wants the adrenaline surge and the control and calculation of being in the field, but the _reason_ he wants to be out there is a reason he hasn’t had to deal with before.

Anger and defeat prickle at the back of his neck.

If he were more selfless, he would let Felicity go, he thinks. He’s never been very good at determining what selflessness _is_. He tries for it, but his own wants always get in the way, distorting everything. 

“I shouldn’t impose,” he tells Thea finally. It’s a change of subject, but it’s one he just can’t help. There are some things he can’t cope with right now.

“You wouldn’t be,” she says. “You really, really wouldn’t be. You’ve been gone so long, Oliver. I just.”

Her voice cracks, but her expression doesn’t. It’s characteristic Thea Queen. Always tenuously and visibly holding herself together even as she cracks and falls apart.

“C’mere,” Oliver draws her in for another hug. She clings to him, her fingers digging into his arms.

“It was all my _fault_ ,” she sobs. “You went for _me_ , and you didn’t come back.”

Oliver thinks of the pain of those first few moments of rebirth, of the tar in his lungs and the pain reverberating throughout his body. He thinks of the burn of Ra’s’ blade in his chest and the piercing cold air and the fall…

The fall down, down, down…into oblivion and death. Finally, into death. Only to be yanked back up to life, trapped in his own skin and reminded how extreme pain could be.

And Oliver wraps his arms around his sister. He closes his eyes and holds onto her tightly. He cannot promise never to leave her again. He can’t promise that he’ll always be there.

“I love you,” he says instead. “And I would do anything for you. And I don’t want to leave you again.”

“Then don’t,” Thea says. “Just don’t leave.”

For the moment, her words quell the uneasy, anxious feeling in his gut that’s telling him to go, to run, to get as far away from this place and this reality as he can. The world never belonged to Oliver Queen. The world threw him away and spat him out. He doesn’t belong in suits and ties. He belonged in green leather. He belonged to a bow.

But then that world, the world of vigilantism, the world of The Arrow, abandoned him too. Or maybe he abandoned it.

Whatever the truth, no matter how desperately Oliver wants to run—to find a place of solitude and quiet, to find peace, to suffer the pain of his losses alone, to lick his wounds—he can’t leave Thea again.

He can stay here, suffer here, survive _here_ if it means his sister’s happiness, his sister’s peace. It may destroy him, but at least it will destroy him slowly.

“So,” he tries to keep his tone light. “When do I get to meet your girlfriend?”

* * *

 

The apartment feels eerily quiet and dark as Felicity locks the door behind her.

She wanders into the living room, looking at the room around her. Exhausted, she falls back against the wall behind her, letting her knees buckle as she slides to the floor.

There’s laundry that needs folding, a kitchen that could be cleaned, and a dozen and a half things she could be doing for vigilante reasons. It feels like the energy to do all those things has been siphoned out of her body.

She loses track of how long she sits, her head spinning with questions and worries. Her chest feels loose and fluttery.

When Tommy returns home, he takes one look at her and sinks down onto the floor beside her, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and tugging her close.

“I don’t want to let either of you go,” Felicity says. “How can I?”

“Okay,” he says. “So how about we start talking about solutions that don’t involve you letting either of us go.”

She eyes him skeptically. “Do those even exist? Without jealousy or strife or anything that means I lose _both_ of you?”

“If we want them to,” he says. “If we work at it. I don’t think either of us wants to lose you. I know I don’t.”

“It’s not going to last.” She closes her eyes and rests her head against his shoulder. “It _can’t_ last.”

She feels him kiss her forehead. “That’s what I thought about you and I. But even if it doesn’t, Felicity, trying is worth it. The time we have where we _do_ work is worth it. That’s what being with you has taught me.”

A fresh wave of tears springs to her eyes. She cuddles even closer to him, fists her hands in his shirt. Tommy’s palm presses against the back of her head, smoothing over her hair.

“I think Oliver should move in with us.”

Felicity jerks back in surprise. Intently, she searches his face, but she sees none of what she was expecting. No jealousy, no heartbroken look in his eyes that says he thinks he’s delivering unto himself his own destruction. “What?”

“We have a guest room. He can’t stay in that cave forever. Besides, he’s been gone a _year_. He needs to be with people. He’ll collapse in on himself if he doesn’t.”

He will, too. Felicity knows that very well. Oliver may be in denial about how much he needs people, but she’s not unaware of it.

“And what are we supposed to do, Tommy?  Just… live here together? The three of us? That simple?”

“For a little while. Until we figure something more definite out.”

“This isn’t you…” she hesitates. “This isn’t you trying to be noble and back away from me slowly?”

“This is…” He looks conflicted. Overwhelmed. “This is me trying to give you what you need. And right now, I think you need reassurance that you’re not going to lose either of us. I think this could give you that. Let us love you for a little bit. Let you love us.”

“I don’t think it can be that simple,” she says.

“It probably won’t be, but we’re gonna figure this out,” he tells her. “All three of us. We just have to go slowly. Be patient with each other.”

“I can’t—” she chokes back a sob. “I don’t think I can… take turns with the two of you, if that’s what you’re about to suggest. I won’t… won’t be the kid you’re fighting for custody of. I can’t _reduce_ either of you like that. Which bed do I crawl into at night? Yours or his?”

He smiles at her, but his eyes are sad. “Whichever one you want.”

“And that won’t… break your heart?”

He lifts one shoulder in half of a shrug. “Maybe it will, but…” She waits patiently while he struggles with saying the words. “You kissed him, right in front of me, and that didn’t break my heart. And right up until then, I’d thought that was the sight that would do it.”

Hope bubbles in her chest, and she stamps it down. They can’t really be having this conversation, can they? “Are you sure? I can’t see this being easy for you.”

“I wouldn’t have suggested it if I wasn’t sure.” Tommy tells her, “You can trust me on that one.”

She twines her arms around his neck, slides a leg over his so she can sit in his lap. “I do trust you. More than anything.”

“So I should talk to him then?” Tommy asks.

“I think it’s better if it comes from you. You’re the one he’s going to be worried about.” He’s the one _she’s_ worried about. Sinking her hands into his hair, she kisses his forehead, his nose.

“I love you,” she tells him. “For a lot of reasons, but right now I love you a lot for even wanting to _try_ to make this work.”

“You’re important to me. You’re _both_ important to me.” He kisses her. She tilts her head to get a better angle and revels in the reassurance of it. Tommy’s always kept her heart safe. “I’m not giving up on you,” he says, running his fingers down the the ridges of her spine. “I never want you to think you’re not worth fighting for.”

Felicity pulls him into a closer embrace, snuggling against him, overwhelmed by emotion. Those words lift a worry that’s been pressing down on her for a while now.

“So are you,” she tells him.

* * *

 

Tommy and Felicity’s apartment doesn’t look quite like Oliver expected. It’s an odd mix of Felicity’s things—one of the couches and three of the lamps are easily recognizable—and Tommy’s belongings. There’s something oddly comfortable about the familiar furniture. He recognizes just about all of it, from either Tommy’s old apartment or the loft Oliver shared with Felicity.

It took both Tommy and Felicity to get him to agree to this. He could handle staying in the lair for a while until they figured more out. (And it terrified Oliver that he didn’t _know_ , wasn’t _certain_ , who Felicity was going to choose when it came right down to it.)

Oliver throws together the clothes he bought with Thea and gets a ride with Felicity back to the apartment.

The guest room has the bed Oliver used to share with Felicity. Same bedspread and everything. He lets his bag of clothes fall to the floor and sets his hand down gently on the pillow.

“Seemed like a waste to get rid of it,” Felicity says from the doorway. “And sometimes, when I miss you, I’ll come in here. It helps.”

Oliver didn’t have a place to miss Felicity when he was inside the League. He didn’t have a picture, or a memento, or even his wedding ring. He turns back toward her. “I’m glad you could.”

“Me too,” she says softly. “Tommy just threw lasagna in the oven. It’ll be ready soon. Don’t—” She hesitates. “Don’t just make yourself at home here, Oliver. Be _home_ here. As much as you can. You can’t imagine how much I wanted you to come home to me.”

He’s helpless when she cries. He puts a hand on her shoulder and pulls her close. “We will figure this out,” he tells her, though he isn’t sure which one he’s reassuring. “We will.”

Against his chest, she nods. Pulling back, she pushes herself up on her tip-toes. There are tears in her eyes. “Will you kiss me, Oliver? Please? It’s been so long, and I just—”

He cuts her off by fulfilling her request. He kisses her exactly how he’d imagined kissing her after he returned, with every bit of longing and heartache and loneliness that’s finally abated. She wraps both arms around his neck and leans her body into his.

When they break away, Felicity dropping back down onto her heels, Oliver can see Tommy standing in the hallway.

An apology rises to Oliver’s lips, but he resists it. Still, there’s something in Tommy’s eyes that makes Oliver’s anger at this entire situation burn in his chest.

“Felicity,” Tommy says, voice cracking. “Can I talk to Oliver for a second?”

She doesn’t react with any surprise, just nods her head slowly and exits as Tommy enters. Their hands brush as they pass each other, and Oliver’s eyes don’t miss the way they grab on for just a moment and squeeze before letting go.

“Tommy,” Oliver starts quietly, once Felicity is out of earshot.

“We both knew this wasn’t going to be easy,” Tommy says. “I’m sure you’re going to have your moments.”

“I don’t—” Anxiously, Oliver rubs the back of his neck. “I’m not even sure what to _say_ in this situation.”

“She still wears your sweaters,” Tommy tells him. “She still walks to Jefferson’s every Sunday for coffee and bagels, like the two of you used to. Sometimes she lets me go with her. Sometimes she doesn’t want me to. Your wedding photo is on our mantel. The ring you gave her sits on her dresser, and sometimes when she thinks I’m not looking, she picks it up. She sleeps on the left side of the bed because I’m pretty sure that was your side and she doesn’t want to look over and see me there.”

Oliver looks past Tommy at the wall behind him. Everything he’s feeling is intense and looking at Tommy only makes it worse right now. “Why are you telling me this?”

“All I’m saying is that your marriage to her has been part of my marriage to her from day one.” He shrugs. “I don’t know why it would start bothering me now.”

“Because I’m…” Oliver shrugs, helplessly. “I’m _here_. And I wasn’t before.”

“Hey,” Tommy steps closer, presses his palm against Oliver’s shoulder. The touch is firm, grounding. “Neither of us is anything but glad that you’re here.”

“I don’t know how to do this,” Oliver says.

“Good.” Tommy makes a sound that’s almost a chuckle. “Because neither do we. We’ve got a lot to figure out together.”

That’s probably an understatement, but Oliver lets it go. They have to figure out _everything_. They’re balanced precariously on a knife-edge. This can’t last, but Oliver will accept it while it does.

He said yes to this agreement because being away from Felicity felt unbearable. More than that, it felt unfair. And damn it, just holding her again, kissing her again, is enough to cement the resolution in his heart to fight. Not _against_ Tommy, but _for_ Felicity. For their future.

Because Oliver needs to believe that he has a future. He needs to believe there’s some kind of hope for him in this world still.

Dinner is quiet. The food is flavorful, and Felicity’s found an excellent bottle of red wine, but it’s been a long time since Oliver has eaten something heavy like lasagna, so he mostly eats his salad. Tommy pushes his food around on his plate. Felicity mostly nibbles at her piece of garlic bread and ignores her pasta. She doesn’t touch her wine.

The three of them are placed around the circular table so that Felicity and Tommy are next to each other, but Oliver and Felicity are across from each other.

For three people who are used to telling each other everything, they don’t talk to each other much. None of them seem to know what to say. They don’t talk about Oliver’s time in the League, or about the years he’s been gone. He can _feel_ the questions. But neither Tommy nor Felicity asks them.

It’s not out of discomfort or ignorance, it’s out of respect, and Oliver knows it.

They stick to safe topics. Thea, for one. Her ascent to Speedy. (And her choice of the name. Oliver has to fight back a burst of tears when he hears Thea turned down the alias of Red Arrow in favor of a name in his memory.)

He doesn’t ask about Malcolm. He knows what would have happened if either of them had encountered him. And that’s a conversation for another day.

After dinner, Oliver wanders into the living room to find Felicity stretched across the long couch that used to be in Tommy’s apartment. Her head rests on a pillow that’s leaning against Tommy’s thigh. Tommy’s idly strumming the guitar he’s holding.

For a moment, his heart lurches in his chest, an uncomfortable feeling that makes him want to turn around and walk right back out. He’s not accustomed to the sensation, especially where Tommy and Felicity are concerned. If it were just Felicity by herself…

Oliver follows that thought. What would he do if it were _just_ Felicity, with none of this trepidation because of their circumstances?

Shoving down any hesitation, he walks over to them. He expects to have to lift Felicity’s ankles in order to sit down on the opposite end of the couch from Tommy, but she bends her knees as she sees him approach and gives him a soft smile.

Pulling off Felicity’s shoes, Oliver presses his thumbs into the ball of her foot, and she groans happily.

Tommy turns his head. He looks down at Felicity, then quickly over at Oliver. Something unspoken passes between them. The corner of Tommy’s mouth quirks up just a touch, and calm settles over Oliver. They’re okay, the three of them, in this moment.

Tension eases out of his shoulders as he continues to massage Felicity’s feet. Her toenails are painted a light purple color.

Oliver finds a pressure point with his thumb, and Felicity lets out a moan that sounds a little like something Oliver might hear in different context. Tommy strums a chord that’s terribly out of key.

Felicity tenses, as if she’s suddenly realized how tense the room has gotten. Oliver runs his hand across her shin, reveling in the smoothness of her skin, the softness of it. How real she feels under the pads of his fingers.

He slides his hand up her leg, curling his fingers beneath her knee. Felicity shudders, her body twisting slightly.

Oliver watches as Tommy’s hand falls to Felicity’s curls, how he brushes the strands back with his fingers. Felicity closes her eyes, Oliver isn’t sure whether it’s because of Oliver’s ministrations or Tommy’s or a combination of both.

 He slows the movement of his hands gradually. He considers waiting for a good moment to stop and slip out of the room, away from the strangeness of the situation. In the end, he stays. Because he feels like he’s been starving for the touch of another human. One that comes with peace and comfort, not distress and pain.

It’s not enough, not nearly, but it’s all he can allow himself to take for now.

* * *

 

Later that night, Oliver’s just taken off his shirt when there’s a soft knock at the door. He opens it to find Felicity, standing in a knee-length nightgown decorated with red flowers and ladybugs. “Can I sleep with you tonight?” she asks, then immediately she closes her eyes and winces. “Not sleep like sex, just… just _sleep_ sleep. In the same bed, obviously, but I think adding sex to either side of this equation would be really messy this early on, which is not to say that I don’t _want_ to have—” She sucks in a breath, and he can practically hear her counting down from three.

Oliver opens the door wider in a clear invitation. “Tommy knows you’re here?”

She nods, and sits down on their—his—bed. “He does. I told him I wanted to be here tonight. He understood.”

Understanding is a far cry from liking, and Oliver isn’t sure he’d like it much if the shoe was on the other foot. He pushes those thoughts aside and sits beside her. “Are _you_ okay with that?”

“I’m here, Oliver,” she says.

That’s not an answer. But he lets it be.

They curl into bed together. She takes the right side—what he knows to be _her_ side—and Oliver wraps himself around her as thoroughly as possible. She feels like home. She smells like home. There’s not a specific Felicity smell—she’s not lavender or raspberry or anything like that—but Oliver inhales and tears prick his eyes because sense memory doesn’t lie or forget. She smells and feels _right_.

He doesn’t fall asleep, but he feels it when she does, when her breathing evens out. He doesn’t want to fall asleep. If he does, maybe he wakes up to find that this is all a dream. That he’s still in Nanda Parbat, chained at the wrists, curled up on a dirty floor.

Much better to be here with Felicity, warm and safe.

She wakes up from a nightmare an hour later, screaming. He’d felt her growing restless, but he’d been dozing himself, and his arm had loosened around her.

“Hey,” he says, lightly shaking her shoulder. “Felicity, sweetheart. You’re okay.” He murmurs all kinds of things, that she’s safe and home and nothing is going to hurt her.

She rolls over, eyes still closed, reaching for him blindly, and mumbles, “Tommy.”

When he goes rigid with hurt and shock, her eyes open and instantly flood with tears. She touches his face. “Oliver.”

She makes no effort to explain, and he doesn’t need her to. He holds her close and strokes her hair and lets her cry into his shirt. For the first time, he’s struck by just how torn she is, how close to coming apart.

And he can’t have that. He won’t.

Tommy wouldn’t either. That’s why Oliver’s here, and Oliver knows it. Felicity can’t choose. She doesn’t know how to not love them both.

Just like that, he knows what to do.

“C’mon,” he says, once she’s calmed down a little bit. He climbs out of bed.

“Oliver?” she says in a tired voice. “What are you doing?”

She rubs at her eyes, and he reaches for her. Sleepily, she responds. He picks her up easily, letting her wrap her arms around his shoulders and using his hands to keep her thighs snug around his waist. The apartment is a little difficult to navigate in the dark, but Oliver manages, maneuvering the both of them down the hall to the master bedroom—to Felicity and _Tommy’s_ bedroom.

“Where are we going?” Felicity mumbles against his chest.

“It’s okay,” he tells her, pushing open the door without knocking.

Tommy sits up as they enter. “What’s wrong?” His eyes are red, and the clearness of his voice tells Oliver he wasn’t asleep.

Oliver doesn’t ask, he just announces, “We’re sleeping with you.”

Felicity’s gasp echoes throughout the room. Oliver feels her turn her head to look at Tommy.

“Oh,” Tommy says, his gaze moving from Oliver to Felicity. The two of them share a silent conversation Oliver doesn’t bother to try and interpret, but then Tommy softly, almost hopefully whispers, “Okay.”

Oliver gently sets Felicity down on the bed. She crawls towards the middle of the mattress, towards Tommy, who is already reaching for her, almost desperately. As soon as she’s settled, Tommy clings to her like she’s his greatest source of comfort. Oliver stands silently for a moment. Watches. Waits for his heart to rip in two.

But then Felicity’s holding out her hand to Oliver, and he’s climbing in bed next to her without another thought. He spoons against Felicity’s back, the same way he was before.

Felicity wiggles a little between them. Oliver lets out a sigh of relief, feeling tension he hadn’t realize he was carrying slowly slip out of him. There’s a touch on his arm that’s not Felicity’s, but suddenly he’s too tired to care. The thoughts that had been keeping him awake are getting more and more distant with every moment. Above Felicity’s head, Tommy’s fingers wrap lightly around Oliver’s wrist, his thumb brushing against the ridges of Oliver’s knuckles.

The two men share a look—and yeah those are absolutely tears in Tommy’s eyes as Felicity slides her arm around his neck—but neither says a word.

And for the first time since Oliver’s returned, he feels like he’s done something right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross your fingers and hold your heart that I have an update for you all on March 9th.


	19. PART THREE: CHAPTER NINETEEN

Felicity wakes up in perfect contentment. She’s warm and safe. She turned herself around at some point during the night, because when she cracks open one eye, she’s looking at Oliver’s sleeping face, rather than Tommy’s.

She hasn’t woken up to his face in a long, long time. Behind her, Tommy shifts. His chin rubs against the back of her neck, causing his stubble to scrape against her skin.

“Morning,” he whispers, right against her ear. She shivers. That particular tone of his has always promised great things.

Great things that cannot happen this morning. For just a second, she imagines Tommy continuing to kiss the side of her neck, his body pressing against hers and Oliver opening his eyes and moving closer to kiss her mouth.

Felicity shuts that thought down quickly. She keeps her palm pressed against Oliver’s chest, right over his heart. He seems to be deeply asleep. She’s not sure he is. “I hate knowing that he went through so much and I couldn’t do anything about it.”

Tommy kisses her shoulder. “I know, sweetheart. I do too.”

“Thank you for loving him,” she whispers.

“Honey,” Tommy says, pressing another kiss to the nape of her neck. One of his hands absently cups her breast, just, Felicity suspects, because he can. “You don’t have to thank me for that.”

“I know,” she says. “But I’m thankful for it all the same. For the first time I think I’m starting to feel like everything is going to be okay.”

Without really thinking about it, the movements feeling as natural as existing, Felicity twists around in Tommy’s arms. He sits up a little, leaning over to kiss her mouth. His lets his lips linger over her jaw, the side of her neck as he settles back down behind her, his chest at her back.

The touch of Oliver’s hand over hers on his chest turns her attention back to him.

Oliver’s eyes open slowly. His gaze is unfocused for a few seconds, but then his eyes meet Felicity’s and he smiles. Taking the hand pressed to his breastbone in his, Oliver draws it to his mouth, kisses her knuckles.

“Hi,” she says, brushing the backs of her fingers against the side of his face.

“You both look like some kind of dream,” he says sleepily.

Felicity smiles and pushes herself forward to kiss him good morning. It’s soft and sweet, but Tommy’s hands are still on her—he doesn’t let go—and that thrills her in a way she almost can’t describe.

“Can we just stay right here?” Felicity mumbles, settling back down between them. “Right here? It’s warm and safe and nice. Can’t we just never move?”

“Fine with me,” Oliver says, tipping his face up to kiss her forehead.

Tommy hums in agreement, and it doesn’t escape Felicity’s notice that while Tommy’s hand is resting against her thigh, Oliver’s hand is resting next to Tommy’s, but their fingers are interlocked.

An idea flashes in her head, just a flicker, a glimpse. It’s there and gone in an instant, a burst of _but what if?_

She only has a few quiet moments to think about it, however, because Tommy sits up. She grabs onto his arm to pull him back down into the cuddle pile with her, but he sweetly kisses the inside of her wrist and says, “I want pancakes.”

“Cinnamon swirl pancakes?” Felicity asks, interested.

He smiles at her, giving her hand a gentle squeeze. “If that’s what you want, babe.”

“What about me?” Oliver asks playfully. “Do I get cinnamon swirl pancakes too?”

Tommy’s smile changes when he looks at Oliver, but it doesn’t _fade_ , it just looks different than how he smiles at Felicity. “If that’s what you want, babe,” he teases.

They share a look that Felicity doesn’t understand, but they’re not mad at each other or jealous of each other. In fact, they’re as close to normal as she’s seen them in a while, so she’ll take it.

Felicity doesn’t bother to change out of her pajamas. She sets the table while Tommy flips pancakes and Oliver fries bacon. When she’s finished setting out the silverware, Felicity pours sugar and heavy whipping cream into a bowl. While the boys cook, she sits on the counter and whisks up a batch of fresh whipped cream.

She grabs a dollop with her finger and sucks it into her mouth. Tommy almost drops his spatula. Oliver winks at her with a sly smile. She wonders what he’s thinking, but then the moment passes. 

Oliver takes the bowl from her hands and heads for the table. Tommy wraps an arm around Felicity’s waist and helps her down to her feet. It’s a movement he’s done so many times that Felicity almost can’t help the things it does to her body. She stares up at him, heart pounding, wanting to wrap her arm around his neck to drag him down and kiss him.

She’s not used to holding herself back from either of them. She’s used to being able to freely dispense her affection. Both of them have always needed it so desperately. She has too, for that matter.

Holding herself back from them—from either of them—feels wrong. They’re the two halves of her heart.

So Felicity leans forward and kisses him.

It’s not just her lips that she presses against him; it’s her whole body. She shivers and aches and delights in the firmness of his grip on her arms.

When she pulls away, it’s to the sight of Tommy smiling down at her. Together, they follow Oliver over to the table.

They eat together, the conversation so different now from how it was last night. It ebbs and flows, shying away from the awkwardness that permeated the discussion at that meal. And Felicity finds that she’s ravenous, like her body needs to make up for her lack of appetite last night. She eats bacon and fruit and pancakes with relish. Oliver, she notices, sticks mostly to fruit, but he eats one single pancake, with a very light dusting of powdered sugar.

When they finish breakfast, Tommy pulls her into the hallway to softly explain that he needs to stop in at Verdant. “Kelsey’s out sick,” he says, and Felicity frowns, because that’s very unlike their normally freakishly-reliable bar manager. “I just need to cover for a few hours, and then Teddy’s gonna leave his parent’s anniversary party a little early to cover her shift.”

Felicity doesn’t like Teddy as much as she does Kelsey, but she’s done a thorough enough background search that she can confirm that he’s not into anything shady. He’s rough around the edges, but he’s not _bad_.

“Okay,” she tells Tommy, kissing him quickly on the lips. “We’ll be here when you get back.”

“I love you,” he says, and he kisses her again, deeper this time.

“Hey.” She cups his face with her hand, taking a quick breath to replace the one he’d stolen with his kiss. “You know that I—that we…”

Briefly, Tommy glances past her, deeper into their apartment. “I know, Felicity. Be who you need to be today.”

Lifting her other hand to his face, she waits for his eyes to meet hers again. His gaze is soft and deep as it holds hers, and he looks at her like she’s the setting sun, gorgeous and gradually slipping away from his sight.

“I love you,” she says, and the emphasis is not on the first or last word but on the one in the middle.

Tommy wraps his fingers around her wrists and pulls her hands away from his face, pausing to kiss her knuckles. “Help him,” he tells her. “He needs you right now.”

“He needs you too,” she counters.

“Yeah.” Tommy sighs. “But not right now.”

When he leaves, Felicity locks the door carefully behind him, and then heads back to the living room.

Oliver is sitting awkwardly on the couch. He’s hunched forward, his legs slightly spread, and his elbows are braced on his knees.

He doesn’t quite know what to do with himself, Felicity realizes. Eating and sleeping and showering are all well and good, but the Oliver she married had a mission. He never had time during the day to slow down.

What does he have now? Now that his mission has become hers? Now that he can’t fit back into his life because everything’s changed?

More importantly, how does Felicity help him? She wants to help him. She wants him to _stay_. And she knows Oliver. His response to emotional pain is to run for the hills.

Felicity steps over to him. She places a hand at the top of his head, gently running it down his neck until he looks up at her. In his eyes she sees loss and heartache. She sees pain and confusion.

More than that, when she moves her touch to his cheek, when she lifts his face and smoothes her fingers across his brow, Felicity sees surrender.

And just like that she knows what he needs.

“Come with me,” she says.

“Where?” he asks.

“Just come,” she says again.

He does.

The park is a brief walk from the apartment, and Felicity doesn’t let her hand leave Oliver’s the entire time. They walk at a slow, even pace down a cobblestone lane hidden from the sun by trees on either side.

There’s a lake in the middle of the park. Sometimes people fish from the end of a pier, sometimes there are motorboats or sailboats skimming through the water, but today it’s just clear. Felicity walks with Oliver to the end of the pier, rolls up her jeans, and kicks off her shoes. Together they dangle their feet in the water and watch as birds swoop overhead and children play off to one side. There’s a soccer game going on about a hundred yards behind them, and they can hear the shouts and cheers of parents and teammates and coaches.

“I like coming here,” she tells him. “It reminds me what we fight to protect. Not just for ourselves, but for everyone.”

“It’s bright,” Oliver says, lifting a hand to shade his eyes as he studies the area around him. And those are the only words he speaks for a long time.

Fifteen minutes or so later, he speaks again. “They didn’t let me outside often.”

Felicity doesn’t say she knows, but she had guessed.

“They kept me locked up,” he says. “It was dark and cold and small. I just sat and waited for it all to end. Sometimes I thought of ending it myself, but I knew they could just bring me back… again and again and again.”

She feels her heart crack open at his words, but all she can do is sit and stare at the ripples in the water, at their constant ebb and flow. As she sits and waits, Oliver’s words follow their lead. He starts, then stops, then starts again.

He describes things she can’t imagine. He describes a level of suffering she can’t comprehend. Her eyes burn with tears of hurt and anger. If Ra’s wasn’t dead, she would kill him.

The pressure of his fingers wrapped around hers has grown tight. “I just wanted to get back to you. See you one more time. Sometimes I thought maybe that would be enough. Sometimes I think it should be, but I’m so greedy, Felicity. I always want more than I deserve.”

She shushes him then, drawing her fingers across his temples, pulling his forehead down to press against hers. “You are mine. And you are loved. And that has nothing to do with what you ‘deserve.’”

When the blue sky fades behind a quilt of dark grey clouds, Felicity stands to her feet. The wind has kicked up, and it whips her curls viciously behind her.

Oliver hates storms. She knows this from countless sleepless nights.

“Come on,” she says as he stands. “Let’s go back.”

He takes her hand, and together they run.

They’re halfway back to the apartment when the sky breaks open and rain starts to come down in sheets. Felicity shrieks and Oliver doesn’t hesitate a second before he’s hauled her onto his back and is running through the downpour. She wraps her arms around his shoulders and holds on for dear life.

Hand in hand, they run up the stairs rather than wait for an elevator, and Felicity’s shaking from the chill when they stumble back into the apartment.

She strips off most of her clothes and her soggy shoes in the hallway, and Oliver does the same. They find towels in the spare bathroom and Felicity throws him one, wrapping another around her middle as she shucks off her soaked undergarments. She snags one of Oliver’s shirts, pulls it over her head, and sets to towel-drying her hair.

When she glances over at him, Oliver is shirtless, shoving off his jeans, with his damp grey tee in a pile on the floor. Somehow his boxers aren’t even wet, and he tugs on a pair of grey sweats.

She starts to shake in earnest, and he reaches for her, pulling her against him. He’s solid and warm, and it settles down her shivering almost immediately.

“I love you,” she whispers.

He says her name. It settles something inside her.

She wants to kiss him. She thinks about the morning, about how uncomplicated it was to kiss Tommy when he helped her down from the counter.

So she leans up and kisses Oliver.

His mouth slants over hers, hot and wanting. His hair is wet and droplets of water drip down onto her face. She’s wrapped up in his shirt and his arms. The calluses on his fingers are rough as his hand slides up her thigh.

What starts as frantic and insistent changes in the stillness between the first kiss and the second. There’s a moment to breathe, the flicker of Oliver’s gaze as it drops from her eyes to her lips, and then lifts up again. There’s the grip of his fingers against her waist, underneath his shirt, hot against her skin. There are her own hands, flat against his back, along his ribs, feeling his chest rise with his every inhale and exhale.

And beyond the two of them and their little world, there’s the rain pelting against the window. There’s the noise and hustle and bustle of Starling City.

They come together in a series of soft touches, of quiet, silent exploration. It’s Oliver first, his touch familiar and foreign all at once. He remembers all the right places to touch, all the ways to make her knees weak and her head spin.

They fall onto his bed—the guest bed— _their_ bed—in a mess of limbs. They kiss and touch and Oliver’s hands are all over her and hers are all over him. It’s slow. It’s rediscovery. It’s homecoming.

Oliver unbuttons his shirt, the one Felicity threw on in her rush for clothes, and he kisses down her breastbone, across her stomach, around her navel. She runs her fingers through his hair and touches the scars on his shoulder.

They don’t have sex.

Felicity considers it, briefly, when Oliver’s mouth is on her breast and his hips are rocking against hers. She thinks about how right it would feel, how _perfect_. But something stops her. It’s not Oliver. He’s soft and surrendered and _hers_ and he would give her the moon if she merely said the word.

It’s an awareness, perhaps, of the complexity of their situation. She hasn’t had sex with Tommy since Oliver’s returned, even though there has been more than one moment where she’s wanted to. It’s not because she’d consider it a betrayal, or even that she thinks he would.

Sex with Oliver or sex with Tommy _will_ complicate everything. Felicity knows that it will.

And right now, in Oliver’s arms, everything is gloriously simple. Contentment floods over her. _This_ —them, together, alive, breathing the same air—is what they need in this moment. Souls bared, _i love you’s_ and _i want you’s_ and _you’re here you’re here you’re here_ , whispered between them create a moment far more intimate than sex.

They settle into the quietness, still wrapped up in each other, doing nothing, looking at nothing, saying little. Eventually, Felicity glances down and realizes that Oliver’s eyes have closed. An expression of pure peace has washed over his face. His breathing is deep and slow.

She keeps her arms wrapped around her husband and holds him as he sleeps.

* * *

 

That night, Oliver expects Felicity to stay with Tommy. Not just because they had the afternoon and most of the evening together, although that is part of it. The other part is the fact that he _knows_ her. It was his bed she chose last night. It would make logical sense to sleep with Tommy tonight, and Oliver just has a sense that’s what she’ll do.

And honestly, he’ll take it. What he got with her in the afternoon was more than he ever thought to hope for during his time with the League. What he got was peace. Absolution. Rest. It’s the greatest gift she could have given him.

He would have had sex with her, if she’d asked. But she didn’t, and he didn’t push. She was aroused. He knows her tells; he knows the hitches in her breath and the blush that spreads across her chest. He knows the pinch of her nails digging into his skin and the shifting of her hips beneath him. He knows all those things. He’s fluent in the language of Felicity’s consent.

If she’d asked, he would have given. No hesitation. Lost in the moment, impulsive and unthinking as ever, he would have given with no expectation of reciprocity. But she never asked.

And Oliver won’t _take_.

He didn’t need to take anyway. He had all he needed, all he wanted. Even if his bed is empty tonight, his heart will be full of getting to hold Felicity again all afternoon. And that _has_ to be enough for now.

Wrist deep in a sinkful of suds, he considers just being the first to head for bed. Maybe that will make it easier on everyone.

Felicity leans back against the counter to Oliver’s right. She places her hand on his arm, right below the end of his rolled-up sleeve. Her palm feels warm against his skin.

“You okay?” she asks.

“I’m here.” He says it like it’s the most important thing because it _is_. He’s _here_. As strange and unexpected as everything about his homecoming has been, today has been good.

“I love you,” Felicity says, drawing her hand down his arm. “You know that, right?”

That cinches which bed she’s sleeping in tonight, but all Oliver says is a soft, “I know.”

With an aching slowness, Felicity moves to kiss him. Oliver puts a hand on her waist, so caught up in the moment that he forgets his hand is wet and soapy until his fingers meet the softness of her cardigan. Caught between him and the kitchen counter, Felicity leans her whole body into him.  He lifts his other hand to the side of her face, presses wet fingers to her cheek.

She feels amazing. One kiss turns to two. Before there can be a third, Felicity turns her head to the side. Oliver can hear her sharp intake of breath as he touches his lips to her jaw, her neck.

“I love you,” he tells her, the words as precarious as the moment they rest in. “Felicity.”

He wants too much for this world. That has always been his problem. He always wants more than fate has been willing to give him. He always wants more than he deserves.

And he can’t ever imagine having truly deserved her.

When she looks up at him, Felicity’s eyes are soft and the crease between her eyebrows is thoughtful. She pushes herself up to kiss his lips again, and Oliver takes the gesture for what it is. He doesn’t push. There’s a greedy part of him that wants to ask, wants to _beg_ to be able to hold her longer, kiss her deeper.

Instead he leaves a half-empty sink and begins the slow walk to the guest room.

His spirits are momentarily lifted when there’s a knock at his door just as he’s getting ready to go to bed.

It’s not Felicity; it’s Tommy. His hands are shoved deep in the pockets of his pajama bottoms. He ducks his head, not meeting Oliver’s gaze.

Oliver doesn’t say anything. He’s not even sure there’s anything worth saying.

Tommy takes a deep breath. “Come sleep with us tonight.”

Relief floods through Oliver, but it leaves almost as soon as it arrives. “Because Felicity wants me to?”

Tommy hesitates. Then he says, “Because I want you to.”

“Okay,” Oliver says. He takes a deep breath. “Okay.”

Tommy gives him a sharp nod. It’s a gesture of understanding. They don’t have to say any more.

Entering Tommy and Felicity’s bedroom feels different than it did the night before. Last night Oliver cared about nothing but the fact that Felicity was in his arms and she needed something he could help give her. He didn’t care about the fact that the _evidence_ of Felicity and Tommy’s marriage was all around him.

But it was. And now it _is_.

The main light from the ceiling fan is off, but there’s a small lamp by the bedside table giving off a warm glow. The door to the master bathroom is closed. Felicity must be inside, because there’s a sliver of light beneath it, and Oliver can hear the water running.

To Oliver’s left there’s a long dresser. The pictures in frames there are of Tommy and Felicity at what must be their wedding. For a moment, all Oliver can think is how beautiful Felicity looks in those moments. Her lipstick is so red, her eyes are so bright, and her dress is so very _her_ and so different from the one she wore at their wedding. Tommy’s looking at her with nothing less than adoration in his eyes.

Felicity’s vanity is next to the window. Oliver recognizes it immediately. It’s her favorite piece of furniture. He can’t count the mornings he watched her sit on the bench in front of it, dressed in nothing but a flimsy robe or his shirt. He remembers the way her head tilted when she slid her earrings on, or clasped a bracelet around her wrist, or dabbed perfume on her neck.

He’s approached the vanity without really thinking about it, and he reaches down to touch the top of Felicity’s favorite perfume. It sprays a small amount onto his fingertips. The scent brings thousands of memories to the surface.

Oliver closes his eyes. When he opens them again, his gaze is drawn to a necklace dangling from the edge of the vanity’s mirror. A single, silver arrowhead on a long chain.

He wonders where Felicity got it. He didn’t give it to her. Oliver touches the point of the arrow.

“Thea gave that to her,” Tommy says. Oliver doesn’t turn around to look at his friend—at his wife’s husband—at _Tommy_. “On your birthday.”

Oliver doesn’t know what to say to that. He’s distracted by the picture frame on the vanity. It’s small, nestled right next to the jewelry box Oliver knows Felicity’s mother gave her as a graduation present. It’s more like two picture frames, really. They’re connected on the side, folded out in a V shape. On the left, there’s Tommy and Felicity together. This picture was obviously not taken at their wedding. On the right is a photo of Oliver and Felicity.

Oliver touches the top of the frame. He waits for Tommy to say something, but Tommy is silent. Oliver turns away from the vanity. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees a black, lacy bra dangling from the handle on the closet door. A pair of Felicity’s heels—the navy blue ones—lay haphazardly beside it.

Felicity’s side of the bed—not her usual side when they were together—has a stack of what Oliver has always thought of as her bedtime reading on the nightstand. Tommy’s side of the bed only has an alarm clock and a water bottle.

Tommy’s laying down on his side of the bed, his legs crossed at the ankles and a book open in his lap. Oliver doesn’t know what to make of that. This whole space isn’t Oliver’s. But neither is this whole space Felicity’s. Or Tommy’s.

Oliver knows the bookcase to the side of the bed. It was his, from his bedroom at Queen Manor. One of the only things he took with him to his own place. Sitting on the shelf is a brown stuffed bear holding a faded red heart. It reads, in white script, “Feel better soon!” It seems familiar somehow.

It’s then that the bathroom door opens, and Felicity steps into the room. Her hair is twisted up in a way Oliver has so often seen it before bed; her face is scrubbed clean of makeup.

She stops moving the moment she sees him, and Oliver realizes that Tommy didn’t tell her what he was doing. He just went and got Oliver.

It’s impossible to miss the way Felicity’s eyes uncertainly sweep over to Tommy, or the way Tommy very carefully nods his head.

Felicity’s sigh of relief seems to drain all the tension from her body, and in a total role reversal of the night before, it’s Oliver’s arms she runs into. It’s Oliver’s chest she cries against.

Oliver wonders if Tommy feels the same way he did the night before. Like he’s done something right. Something good.

Like giving Felicity what she needs is the only thing he needs.

Oliver takes one step back, then two. The backs of his legs hit the edge of the mattress, and he sits down, cradling her in his arms. “I’m here,” he whispers into her hair. “I’m here. I’m here. I’m here.”

“Stay,” Felicity practically begs. “Stay here, Oliver. _Stay_.”

“As long as you want me,” he promises, pressing his face to her neck. She smells like home. She feels like everything he wants and needs. He’s plagued by the terrible thought that someday she might not be his to hold. The thought burns hot across his chest as he revels in the press of her against him. He clings to her like she’s salvation and sin and everything in between.

“I’ll want you forever,” she whispers, lips against his ear, the softness of her breath sending shivers down his spine.

It’s all too much. Wanting her in his arms, wanting this moment—or as near to it as he could imagine—and having that want fulfilled is overwhelming in its intimacy and intensity.

He can’t give her forever. The promise rises in his throat, and he stamps it down. He’s not sure what he can promise her anymore. “You have all my life,” he vows.

“I had that,” she whispers. “It wasn’t long enough.”

The bed behind them shifts. There’s a soft rustle of the covers, but not enough for Tommy to have stood up.

Oliver doesn’t want to turn his head to look, but he does. Tommy’s eyes are focused on the now-closed book in his hands.

But then Felicity _sobs_. It’s one terrible sound, a gasp that melds into a low wail as her hands grasp at Oliver’s shoulders, her nails biting at his skin even through the material of his shirt. Something inside him fractures, splinters, and tears rise to his eyes.

He never wants to hear that sound ever, ever again.

Tommy’s book hits the nightstand. His feet touch the floor, and he quickly moves to them. He stops a foot away from the two of them, his outstretched hand inches away from Felicity.

Reality hits Oliver’s chest like a mack truck. Tommy has heard that sound before. Oliver is sure of it.

Oliver makes eye contact with Tommy. Tommy places his hand on Felicity’s spine, below her neck and above her shoulders. For a second she tenses in Oliver’s arms, but then she melts again. She’s still crying, her whole body shaking with sobs that no longer make sound, her tears hot and wet against Oliver’s shoulder.

Keeping his hands around Felicity, rubbing her back and holding her close, means that Oliver doesn’t have the time to spare to wipe away his own tears. Felicity doesn’t speak, but she doesn’t need to. He knows what the loss of her this past year has felt like. He knows.

Tommy’s hand rubs against Felicity’s shoulder as he sits on the bed beside Oliver. With his other hand, he touches Oliver’s shoulder; the weight of his touch is calming.

The two men look at each other, then at their wife. Tommy leans in, kisses the junction of Felicity’s neck and shoulder, and says, “He’s here. He’s safe.” Emotion cracks in his voice. “I’m here. I’m safe.”

“Don’t leave me,” Felicity chokes out through her tears.

It isn’t clear which one of them she’s talking to.

“We won’t,” Oliver says, and he looks at Tommy.

“We’re not going anywhere,” Tommy agrees. “Nobody’s leaving. Nobody’s leaving you, Felicity.”

Blindly, because her face is still tucked against Oliver’s neck, Felicity reaches for Tommy. Oliver watches as Tommy takes her hand in his and presses it to his lips, then turns his head to kiss the inside of her wrist.

In Oliver’s arms, Felicity leans back. Oliver raises his hands to brush her hair out of her eyes. She bites her lip and looks from him to Tommy.

Turning her face back to his, Oliver kisses Felicity. It’s soft and slow, but not heated. “We should sleep,” he says, and she nods her head. Her face is wet with her tears; her eyes look raw and red. She turns to Tommy and his kiss is a little more eager, a little more desperate.

Her hips shift against Oliver’s even as Tommy’s hand presses to her cheek. Oliver closes his eyes against intimacies he’s not allowed to want right now. Not… not while Tommy—not while Felicity—his brain can’t follow the thought, so he lets his head fall back onto Felicity’s shoulder. One of his hands grabs at Felicity’s hips. He intends to still them, but instead his grip seems to make the slight grind of them increase.

Felicity breaks the kiss with Tommy, and Oliver’s the one who has to catch his breath, try to slow the racing of his heart. “We should sleep,” he tries again.

Taking Felicity’s hands, Tommy pulls her up to her feet—and off of Oliver’s lap. The touches between them are long and familiar, and they make Oliver’s stomach feel like it’s full of concrete.

But Tommy just leads Felicity around to one side of the bed, and helps her climb beneath the covers, passing her a few tissues. Then Tommy shuts the light off. Felicity wipes at her eyes and blows her nose, and when Oliver has slid in beside her, she rolls into his embrace as eagerly and easily as she did to Tommy’s the night before.

At Felicity’s back, Tommy fits himself against her like their bodies are pieces in a puzzle.

Oliver reaches across Felicity to put a hand on Tommy’s shoulder. In the dark, Tommy’s eyes shine with something Oliver doesn’t have the ability to put a name to. Gratitude? Relief? Oliver doesn’t know. He squeezes Tommy’s shoulder, and then with his fingers, Oliver follows Tommy’s arm down to his hand. It’s easy to take Tommy’s hand in his, easy to hold onto him in this small way.

Tommy closes his eyes. Oliver breathes deeply. Felicity’s curls tickle his nose. Content, he drifts into sleep.

* * *

 

It’s Tommy who wakes from a nightmare that night.

He doesn’t remember specifics, just the feelings. Loneliness, despair, terror, and then he’s forcing himself awake, jerking upright as his eyes fly open.

He glances down at Felicity, sleeping peacefully on the bed between him and Oliver, her blonde hair spread out across the pillows.

Silent as he can be, Tommy slips out from beneath the comforter, careful not to make any noise as he sneaks out of the bedroom and down the hall.

_Malcolm is dead_.

Malcolm is dead, and Ra’s is dead. Oliver is _alive_.

And still there is this dread in his gut, this terror inching down his spine. Nothing is okay. No one is safe. And no one ever will be again.

He hasn’t put his hood on since Oliver came back, and he aches for it. He yearns for the outlet, for the adrenaline surge and the release of tension.

Instead, Tommy pads into the kitchen. He fixes himself a bowlful of leftovers, thinking idly of a mother whose bed he would crawl into when he couldn’t sleep, of a father who told him to man up and sent him back to his room. He thinks of the way Rebecca would say his father’s name, of the way she would press her hand to his back and lead him back down the hallway anyway, how she would kneel beside his bed, brush back his hair, and promise him that he was safe.

He thinks of Oliver crashed on his bed, bottle of whiskey in one hand. He thinks of the way Oliver had confided in him, made him feel like a brother. He thinks of Oliver’s hand, rough in his hair, and the press and slide of Oliver’s lips, the scrape of his teeth, the touch of his tongue.

“You okay?” Oliver’s voice is roughened with sleep. He has one hand on the wall, bracing himself as he stands in the hallway that leads into the kitchen.

Tommy won’t lie. He stares down at the unevenly microwaved rice and stir-fry in his bowl. It seems even more unappetizing now. He doesn’t tell Oliver he’s not okay.

He wants Felicity’s fingertips on his temples, wants to feel her pulling him down against her, warm and safe. He wants a motorbike beneath him and the feel of his crossbow in his hand. He wants…

He wants the feelings swallowed up in adrenaline and regained control. He wants to stop feeling the loneliness of the young boy whose eyes stung with tears as he hid in his mother’s closet, surrounded by her clothes and her perfume and her scent. He wants to no longer feel strangled by the fear of a leather belt against his back or a palm on his cheek or the twist in Malcolm’s face that means he’ll _feel_ the effects Malcolm’s anger in the morning.

He wants to rid himself of the hopelessness and despair that threaten to swallow him whole, the way they almost did when he lost Oliver. The way they almost did when he lost Oliver _again._

Oliver waits. Tommy expects him to say something, to apologize for dragging Tommy into this world, to take the fault for this, even though Tommy’s demons are not and never have been Oliver’s fault.

Instead, Oliver opens the cabinet beside the refrigerator and takes out two mugs. He starts the kettle on the stove. Tommy sits on one of the island stool and watches. Oliver’s hands are steady as he digs out a container of tea leaves and scoops them into two separate tea infusers.

He pours the water over the leaves and lets them brew for a few minutes before pushing one over to Tommy.

“This better not be your island brew,” Tommy says, lifting the cup to his lips.

“It’s not the island brew,” Oliver says. Tommy takes a sip and realizes that it’s not. It’s strong, but it doesn’t have the horrible aftertaste. Tommy’s only taken a few sips and he already feels the tension seeping out of his shoulders.

Oliver takes a seat next to him. “Man,” he says. “Our lives are so fucked up.”

Tommy looks down at his tea and suddenly wishes it were vodka or whiskey. Anything to take the edge off. He can think of a million other times he and Oliver have sat just like this, bottle of alcohol between them, the overwhelming nature of life weighing on their shoulders.

“Remember your wedding?” Tommy asks. “I remember dancing with her and thinking she was everything I ever wanted for you. She was perfect.”

“Did you love her then?” Oliver’s staring off into the distance, like looking at Tommy might break him.

“Not like that. I _never_ —” Tommy can barely speak around the grief in his chest. “I never would have. You know that Oliver. You _have_ to know that.”

“Do I?” Oliver says, and all Tommy can think about is Laurel. Laurel in those frantic moments when they fell into bed together after Oliver died. Laurel and the happiness he felt with her and how it differs so much from how it feels with Felicity.

“It’s not…” He stops to think. “It’s not how it was with Laurel. Felicity was… Felicity was this sudden burst of goodness in this hell that was living without you.”

He takes a deep breath, trying to find the words to describe his history with Felicity without making it sound as horrible as the bare facts make it sound. Fell in love with the best friend’s girl. "We were both grieving you. I was trying to take care of her. She was trying to take care of me. And somehow in the middle of all that caring… we let ourselves love each other.”

And Tommy keeps talking. He’s not sure what Oliver has been told from Felicity, but Tommy figures it’ll be different from his point of view. He talks about falling in love with a woman he knew loved and lost someone else. He talks about how her love for Oliver was one of the things he loved about her.

“We both…” He takes a sip of tea. “We both knew what we were doing. We knew what we were getting into. We were… we were so in-tune with each other’s hearts in that way.”

He’s talked enough, and there’s still so much to say, so Tommy shuts up. He drinks his tea. Oliver sits beside him. It’s more than Tommy ever thought he would get. His best friend beside him. Felicity’s husband returned to her.

The words he’s wanted to say from the beginning bubble out of him before he can stop them. “I tried to leave her,” Tommy confesses. “When we found out you were alive. I tried to leave.”

Oliver turns to look at him for the first time since the conversation really started. “You didn’t,” he says flatly.

“For Felicity,” Tommy agrees. “She pointed out that if I loved her, I would stay. I would be brave. I would respect her choices. And I love her too damn much to make her cry like that ever again, even if I’m prolonging the inevitable by giving her time to choose you.”

“I can’t…” Oliver sighs deeply. He leans back a bit, staring at a long scar on the inside of his arm. “I can’t blame her for loving you. I can’t blame you for loving her. And I’m selfish. I want your friendship. I want my wife. And I can’t see a world where I get both.”

“I’m with you on that, buddy,” Tommy says, raising his mug of tea in a mock toast. Oliver taps it with his own mug, and neither of them can help chuckling. Because as ironic as it is, they’re the only other person on earth who understands their situation.

“Do you think it would be worse if we were strangers?” Oliver asks. “If I were some guy you could just blindly hate?”

Tommy grins. “Might be worse. You wish I was a stranger?”

“Nah,” Oliver says. “You’d give her that smile, and even as selfish as I am… I’d probably walk away to try to be noble or some shit like that.”

“You’ve always been selfish in your selflessness,” Tommy points out.

Oliver grimaces. “How long are you thinking we can keep this up?”

“This?” Tommy draws in on himself. “What do you mean by this?”

“This,” Oliver gestures to the room around them. “You, me, her… in the same house, in the same bed, living this— _this_.” Another wild motion to _everything_.

“I don’t know.” He’s starting to feel a little panicked. He’d thought—he’d _hoped_ —that things were getting better. One day at a time. Sure, nothing was perfect, but the three of them were coexisting with minimal issues. Tommy was starting to feel like things were going to be alright.

But Oliver wasn’t. Obviously.

Oliver was waiting for the ceiling to cave in.

And really, why shouldn’t he be? Tommy is the interloper here. Tommy is the one who married his best friend’s wife. Tommy is the gear in the machine that’s going to cause a breakdown.

For a moment, he wishes Felicity had taken his offer to let her go. He wishes leaving her wouldn’t hurt her so deeply, wouldn’t hurt _him_ so deeply. He wishes he could just put Felicity back into her happy relationship with Oliver.

And beneath all that, buried so deeply below the surface that Tommy can pretend to ignore it is the fact that he wants _Felicity_.

He wants to be chosen over Oliver this time. He wants to be the one picked, who gets the girl and keeps her. He knows it’s unfair. He knows Oliver has grown. He knows that his own past relationship with Laurel fell apart for its own reasons. He knows that he wouldn’t exchange his marriage to Felicity for anything.

But _dammit_. He wants the girl. He wants Oliver. He _wants_.

Maybe Oliver isn’t the only one who hides his selfishness by feigning selflessness.

“I just mean,” Oliver says, “It feels like we’re on a seesaw. And the three of us are doing a phenomenal job balancing it to keep all of us from getting hurt. I just can’t help wondering when it’s all going to fall down.”

That doesn’t take away all of the anxiety tearing through Tommy, but it settles it a bit.

“Nothing good in my life lasts,” Oliver continues. “Not even her, and she was the one thing that was supposed to be forever. At some point, this can’t last either.”

“And if you look at it like that,” Tommy says, “It won’t.”

Oliver slumps over a bit, cupping his mug with both hands.

Carefully, Tommy sets a hand on Oliver’s shoulder. “We just gotta take this one day at a time.”

“Sometimes I think minute-by-minute might be a better way to go,” says Oliver.

“Guys.” They both look up at the same time to see Felicity standing in the doorway. Tommy wonders how much she’s heard. But then lifts her left hand and waves her cell phone in the air.

“We have a problem.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I honestly have no idea when the next update will be. But it will happen. Promise.


	20. PART THREE: CHAPTER TWENTY

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trouble begins brewing in Starling City

 

Oliver stares up at the green suit. It’s surrounded on all sides by glass. There’s no door, no way to easily remove it for use. It’s just there. Beneath the suit is a small gold plaque that reads _We Remember_.

“Here,” Thea says, coming up to stand beside him and offering him a hammer. “Fastest way to get in is to break it.”

Oliver hesitates.

“Do it,” Felicity says quietly. She comes to stand beside Thea, her tablet cradled carefully in her left arm. “Cisco’s coming up with something new, but it’ll still be another week or two.”

“I—” Oliver starts. He doesn’t _want_ to. And the reasons are complex and tangled. He doesn’t have time to sort through them.

Thea puts the hammer in his hand. “We’re running short on time,” she says.

“It’s just glass, Oliver,” Felicity says, her voice gentle. “I’ll order a replacement after this is over.”

He doesn’t have the luxury of waiting. He needs to go. They all need to go.

In the end, Tommy breaks the display. Oliver walks away so he doesn’t have to see the shards of glass sprinkled all over the floor.

Everything was put in place. His memory, his legacy, was preserved. And then his return shattered everything. It feels a little too appropriate a metaphor for the situation.

A few seconds later, Thea approaches him and hands him the suit so he can get changed. She’s already laced up her jacket, though she has yet to put on her gloves. It’s strange to see her dressed up as Speedy. The last time Oliver saw the costume it was in a box. It looks good on her.

He changes into the green leather as quickly as he can. His bow, to his surprise, has been well maintained. He’s not sure who has been taking care of it, but someone clearly has, because it’s still in working order.

Felicity’s trace on a kidnapped girl’s cell phone finally comes through. “Sometimes, some crimes, there’s nothing we can do,” she’s told him before. “The police have the situation well in hand. But every once and awhile there are times where I know my skills can fill in some of the authorities’ blanks. Captain Lance sent me this one to see what I can do.”

Oliver laces up his boots and glances over at his wife. She’s staring intently at her screens, biting her lower lip.

If this were before, he’d go claim a kiss goodbye. He’s not completely sure he’s allowed to do that now, but on the off chance he doesn’t come back…

He wants, as simple as it sounds, a kiss goodbye.

He doesn’t have to worry about it because she approaches him. She straightens his mask, lifts his hood, and with his face in her hands, she kisses him long and hard.

Oliver hears a cough—probably Roy—but his eyes are closed and Felicity is kissing him and he doesn't care.

She pulls away and says, “Come back.”

“I will,” he promises, trying not to think about the tears threatening to spill from her eyes.

“I’ve got his back,” Tommy says, coming up beside them.

Oliver looks down so he can finish pulling on his gloves. Just how long _can_ they do this without injuring each other beyond repair? He glances over at Tommy as Felicity turns to go back to her screens.

The four of them—Thea, Roy, Tommy, and Oliver—head out on motorcycles. Felicity fills them in over comms on the way.

She traced the girl’s phone to an abandoned office building. It had been leased up until a month ago by an organization Oliver had never heard of. Felicity was already cross checking names of their employees to see if any of them have criminal records or a tie to the missing girl. So far she hadn’t come up with anything.

“I have infrared,” she tells them as Oliver and Roy race the bikes around a corner in perfect sync. Thea and Tommy at their heels. “This is a bit more of a professional job than I thought it would be. I expected amateurs.”

“What makes you think it’s not professionals?” Tommy asks.

“They left the _phone_ on,” Roy hollers. “That’s the height of stupidity.”

“Not if it’s a trap,” Thea chimes in.

There’s too many of them on this, Oliver thinks suddenly. All four of them, walking into a possible trap? He doesn’t like it.

“All of the outside cameras are still working,” Felicity says. “I’m tapped into their system. But only a few of the cameras in the building are still functional. We’re not going to have the greatest eyes on this. Infrared will help, but not by much.”

She rattles off the locations of the various guards outside the building. There are quite a few of them. More than Oliver was expecting to have to deal with if these are indeed amateurs.

“Speedy and Arsenal,” Felicity says. “You cover the exit. We can’t let them get away with the girl.”

“Copy that, HQ,” Roy says. He slows down and expertly switches places so that Tommy is driving beside Oliver through the nearly-empty Starling Streets.

“Arrow and Quarrel, let me quarterback this.” Felicity says.

“We’ll follow your lead,” Oliver says. They swerve around another corner and slow the bikes down. Thea and Roy split off from them. Oliver knows that they’ll keep driving around the perimeter of the building, in case one of their targets tries to get away.

“One hostile at the back door,” Felicity says. “He’s moving up and down the alley, headed east.”

Oliver and Tommy park the bikes outside the alley behind the building. They’re on the west side, and Oliver doesn’t hesitate for a second before raising his bow and nocking an arrow. He and Tommy make the approach slowly. Any mistakes and the whole building could know that they’re here.

Tommy’s the one who takes the last two quick steps forward to grab the guy. He locks an arm around the man’s neck in a move Oliver’s seen so often he realizes that Diggle must have taught it to him.

Once the guard is down, they turn their attention to the doorway. Tommy slides what looks like a jerry-rigged credit card into the card reader. Oliver hears Felicity say, “Just a moment,” two seconds before the light on the door lock flicks from red to green and they’re inside.

“Sweep the building floor-by-floor,” Felicity tells them. “I’m in the security system, but it looks like the inside cameras have been disabled.”

It surprises Oliver how easily he and Tommy are able to clear the first floor. There’s only one guard patrolling the area, and they take him down as easily as they handled the guard in the alleyway. Still, Oliver isn’t used to having Tommy at his six. He’s used to Diggle or Roy, or even Sara or, but not Tommy. There’s a very different feel to Tommy’s presence in the field. Diggle usually covers Oliver’s back from afar.

Tommy matches him step-by-step. They fall into the pattern of clearing the rooms without speaking. When they travel down the hallways, Tommy keeps his back to Oliver, matching every step Oliver takes forward with a step backward.

They take the stairs a half-floor at a time, Oliver pausing at the landing to watch while Tommy hustles up the steps, then Tommy watching from the landing while Oliver goes ahead. The second floor seems to be filled with individual offices, each divided by glass. It means that nearly the entire room is an open-floor layout, except for several offices at the far end.

It’s _not_ a good place to get into a firefight.

Which means, of course, that’s exactly what happens. Maybe the door from the stairwell opening tipped someone off, or maybe it was just coincidence, but the second Oliver and Tommy step into the room, someone else enters from one of the doors at the far end.

He reaches for his radio and manages to get out, “We’ve got visitors” before Oliver’s arrow pierces through both the radio and right into the man’s hand. He howls in pain and reaches for his gun with his other hand.

It’s Tommy’s arrow that stops him this time.

“More coming,” Felicity says, and her voice doesn’t even _waver_.  “About ten, all converging on your location.”

Oliver curses under his breath, and he knows she heard him. He doesn’t have to tell Tommy to take cover; that’s exactly what Tommy does. They each drop down behind a desk.

“They coming from the stairwell?” Tommy asks Felicity.

“About half,” she answers. “Most of them are coming out of the offices.”

Above Oliver and Tommy’s heads, flashlight beams swing to and fro. They’re looking for them. It’s Tommy’s turn to curse.

“Can you lock the stairwell door?” Thea asks. “Let them bottleneck in there?”

“Sure,” Felicity says. “But that’s not gonna hold them very long.”

“Do it anyway,” Oliver tells her. He and Tommy, without speaking, have figured out an easy way to weave through the desks towards the offices without getting shot. Someone fires a gun, and Tommy pokes his head up from the desk to send a crossbow bolt in their direction. Oliver doesn’t have time to see if it hits its mark.

Adrenaline has already hit him hard, and without it, he probably wouldn’t have caught Felicity’s quick intake of breath over the comms. He doesn’t let that slow him down. It can be handled later. He has to focus.

As they near the group of henchmen, Oliver waits for one of them to step out a little bit farther than the others, then he leaps out from the shadows. One of his hands goes for the man’s gun. He has a flechette in the other, and he buries it in the man’s thigh.

Another gunshot, but Oliver is too busy shoving the man in his arms towards the two running for him. One of them is slowed as they collide with their comrade, but the other doesn’t miss a step. Oliver’s grabbing for him, but he stumbles, falling forward to reveal the black shaft of an arrow protruding from his ribs. Oliver launches himself at the third man and feels almost relieved when his fist hits skin, and he feels the man’s face snap to one side from the force of the blow.

The slam of a door tells Oliver that the men from the stairwell are almost on them. He can hear Felicity’s voice, but he drowns it out in the white noise of the fight that’s upon them. Tommy’s back is against his, and even through two layers of leather, Oliver can feel the warmth of it.

The ensuing fight is brutal, and Oliver feels sick for the way he almost revels in it. He needed this. Needed to punch and kick. Needed to hear the crack of bones and the thud of bodies hitting the floor. He doesn’t stop, not until there’s no one else coming at him.

That’s when he turns to Tommy. He’d almost forgotten Tommy was there, almost forgotten that the man fighting beside him was _Tommy_. It was easier to superimpose another face over his friend’s. It was easier than thinking about how much danger Tommy willingly walked into for him.

“Are you…” Oliver struggles for breath, even as his eyes frantically check his friend for injuries. “...alright?”

“I’m good.” Tommy touches the comm in his ear. “We’re good, HQ.”

Oliver catches the click of Felicity’s microphone being un-muted. When she speaks, her voice is strained, “Glad to hear it, Quarrel.”

Oliver and Tommy exchange a look, and at the same time, they turn to the office room everyone seemed hell-bent on protecting. Oliver can hear the groans of the people they both took out as he steps over bodies to get to the door.

He lifts his bow, and Tommy reaches for the handle. Oliver steps in first, an arrow nocked against the string. There are two occupants in the room: a little girl, duct taped to an office chair, and a man hunched behind her with the barrel of a gun pressed against her temple.

Oliver just lets his arrow fly without thinking.

Beneath the tape sealed over her mouth, the girl screams. The man behind her falls back. Oliver runs for him. Tommy runs for the girl. Oliver can hear him saying, “You’re safe, you’re safe, it’s okay. He can’t hurt you.”

He’s carefully cutting through the duct tape while Oliver checks on her kidnapper. The arrow went through his left eye. Oliver rolls his body over, tries to get him out of sight of the girl.

“Do you know who I am?” Tommy asks the little girl.

She nods. “You’re the Quarrel.”

“That’s right,” Tommy’s smile is visible underneath the hood. “Ready to go home?”

She nods again, her braids bouncing around her shoulders. She reaches for Tommy and he picks her up, cradling her against his chest.

“Close your eyes,” Oliver hears Tommy say. “Until I tell you to open them, okay?”

“Okay,” she whispers in that sweet, almost playful voice little girls have. “Are we going home to my mom?”

“We are,” Tommy promises.

Oliver follows. The little girl has both of the palms of her hands over her eyes.

“I called Lance,” Felicity says. “Police will be at your location in ten.”

Oliver expects them to have to get out of there, but instead, he follows behind Tommy as he carries the little girl into the waiting arms of a policeman. From one of the squad cars, a woman practically bursts out of the backseat, screaming the little girl’s name as tears stream down her cheeks. Oliver hears the child cry, “Mommy!” And then mother and daughter are embracing, and Oliver and Tommy are slinking back into the shadows.

Oliver isn’t sure what to say to Tommy as they hike back to the bikes. Compliments on his decisions in the field seem inappropriate. Just because Oliver hasn’t been around while Tommy was fighting with the team doesn’t mean that Tommy hadn’t trained hard. Oliver’s not Tommy’s leader in the field, not in the way he is with Thea and Roy.

Somehow, Tommy’s become his equal. More like Sara or Diggle. It feels weird. But it also, Oliver realizes, feels _good_. They fought together tonight in a way that they shouldn’t have been able to, given such little experience with each other.

But they were in perfect sync. Perfect.

Roy and Thea zoom off to run a quick patrol, but at Felicity’s direction, Tommy and Oliver head back to the lair.

Oliver realizes why the second they make it inside and he’s thrown his hood back. Felicity’s sitting at her workstation and her hands are shaking. There’s something empty in her eyes that Oliver recognizes but doesn’t ever want to see in _Felicity’s_ expression.

She’s pale and trembling and seems to be having a hard time breathing. One hand is on her chest, her eyes are wide and filled with tears.

It almost brings Oliver to his knees. He stands still from shock, adrenaline pumping through his veins. His feet feel leaden.

His impulse is to fight whatever is hurting her, to protect her however he can. But he can’t protect her from this. There _is_ no protecting her from this. Anxiety and heartache are just part of the cost that must be paid to be in this business; Oliver just wishes the price wasn’t so steep.

Tommy doesn’t hesitate though. He’s reaching for Felicity almost instantly, pulling her in close.

“I can’t,” she’s whispering, even as she shakes in Tommy’s arms. “I thought I could but I can’t.”

“You did great,” Tommy tells her. His tone is soft and careful. His hand cups the back of her head, stroking her curls. “You had our backs. It’s what we needed. It’s more than we could have asked for. _You_ are more than I could ever have asked for.”

“I could just—” Felicity lets out a hiccupping sob. “I suddenly saw a future where I lost _both_ of you at the same time, and I don’t want—I can’t—” She claws a little desperately at the leather of Tommy’s jacket.

Oliver moves toward both of them. Tommy turns his head to look at him. Their eyes meet.

As smoothly as if they’ve been rehearsing it for years, Tommy lets Felicity slip out of his arms and into Oliver’s. The move is almost effortless, though Oliver holds her differently, cupping his hands beneath her elbows and pressing his lips to her forehead.

Felicity lets out a deep breath, and Oliver takes more of her weight. They stand there like that for a few moments, Felicity composing herself and Oliver treasuring the fact that he’s able to hold her after so long without her.

Eventually, Tommy reappears. He’s out of his leathers, dressed now in a gray henley and a pair of dark jeans. He passes Felicity an open water bottle, and she drinks from it greedily, though her fingers still tremble. Tommy rests a hand on her shoulder blade, and she drifts back into his arms.

Oliver takes his cue to go get changed, shoving off his own leathers and exchanging them for jeans and a tee-shirt. He grabs Felicity’s purse and Tommy’s car keys. He tosses the keys to Tommy and hands Felicity her purse.

Felicity’s hands have stopped shaking by the time they arrive at the apartment. Tommy and Oliver keep to either side of her, but her steps are steady as they make the short walk from the elevator to the apartment door.

Once inside, Tommy approaches her gently, running his hands across her shoulders and down her arms. She sways into his touch, and he presses a kiss to her forehead. “Let me start the water for a bath,” he offers, and she nods slowly.

“With bubbles,” she says.

“Always,” he tells her, in the same tone he would use to say _I love you_.

After Tommy leaves, Oliver comes up behind Felicity. He lets his footsteps be loud enough for her to hear him. Oliver wraps his arms around her shoulders, pressing his chest against her back as he curls his body around her, and she reaches up to grab his hand.

“We never asked you,” she says softly.

Oliver’s brow furrows. “Never asked me what?”

“If you wanted to put the suit back on,” she clarifies. “We never even asked you if you _wanted_ to put the suit back on, to take up that mantle again. We assumed you would because we assumed you’re the _you_ that we remembered.”

“But I’m not.” It’s not a question. He knows he’s not. He’s as far separated from the Oliver he was before Ra’s’ sword pierced his chest as he was then to the boy who drowned at sea.

Felicity turns in his arms until she’s completely turned to face him. She touches his cheek with her hand. “That’s not _bad_ , Oliver. And I promise I love the man who came back to me every bit as much as the man who left.”

It’s not the first time she’s told him she loves him since he’s come back. But the words strike him right in the center of his chest and cause the warmth of happiness to spread through him. Everything is chaotic and complicated, and his past hurts like a knife would, but Felicity _loves him_ , and hasn’t this been the way it’s always been with them?

“I don’t know,” he confesses. “I don’t know if I wanted to put the hood on again. I didn’t even think about giving myself the choice.”

“I should have.” There are tears streaming down her face. “ _We_ should have. We should have thought to ask you, Oliver, and we failed you, and I’m sorry.”

“You have nothing to apologize for,” he tells her. Even the thought of Tommy or Roy or Thea going out into the field without him feels ridiculous.

“I do,” she insists. “I stopped looking. I didn’t come save you. I _believed_ that you were dead. I grieved you. And then I _got married_.

“Then you’re forgiven,” he says. “You’re _forgiven_ , Felicity. Now and forever.”

He can hear Tommy’s footsteps coming back down the hall, so he kisses her forehead and says, “Go take a bath. Relax. You’ve earned it.”

For just a moment, she looks uncertain. But then Oliver sees exhaustion wash back over her. She nods, and Oliver watches as she reaches out to touch Tommy’s shoulder as she passes him on her way out of the room.

Neither Tommy nor Oliver speak until after the door to the master bathroom clicks shut. ~~~~

“Before you say it,” Tommy says, with a bit of a bite in his tone, “No, I will _not_ stop putting on the hood.”

Oliver is quiet. He wasn’t going to say it. All he can think about, instead of how Felicity could have lost both of them, is the fact that having Tommy with him made him feel _sure_ that he _would_ make it back to her. With Tommy watching his back and Felicity watching over them both, he’d felt a deep reassurance that he was going to make it back alive. That they were _all_ going to make it back alive.

He wanders over to the living room window and glances out at the lights of his city.

“Oliver,” Tommy says. “Are you _listening_ to me?”

“I—” He swallows thickly. The lights of Starling are brighter than the stars. So many people out there to protect, and the ones who matter most are right _here_. “I don’t _want_ you to take off the hood.”

He doesn’t turn to look at Tommy, but the long silence that follows his statement telegraphs his friend’s surprise. He can hear the sound of the couch creaking as Tommy sits down.

“Why?” Tommy asks.

Oliver leans forward, pressing his hands against the windowsill, thinking about the tremble in Felicity’s hands and the pain in her eyes. “Because you are the same thing she’s always been. My _partner_. The first time I came back to Starling, I was ready to do all this by myself. This time—this time not only did I know that I didn’t want to do it all by myself. I knew I wouldn’t _have_ to.”

“Oliver…” Tommy doesn’t follow his name with a thought. Maybe the only thought Tommy wants to express _is_ his name.

“But I cannot…” Oliver can’t stop the anxiety racing in his chest. “I cannot do this without you. I need you too much. I need you _both_ too much.”

He hears the sounds of Tommy standing, moving away from the couch and towards Oliver. “Is that so bad? Needing people?”

It is when they leave, Oliver knows. It’s bad when you need them and they’re no longer around, when they can’t help you, when you can’t help them. It’s bad and it’s terrifying, and it _hurts_.

It hurts when all you know is cruelty and isolation and you _need_ saving, you _want_ saving, and you know it isn’t coming. When you know that the people who love you, the people you _need_ , aren’t going to come save you.

Oliver tightens his grip on the windowsill. He bends forward a bit, lowering his head. Anger tears through him, and he can barely breathe through the force of it. It burns inside him, but he doesn’t know where to aim it, where to unleash it.  Nyssa isn’t here, Ra’s isn’t here, there’s no one here but Tommy and Oliver doesn’t want to hurt him by unleashing all the venomous words building up inside him.

Tommy doesn’t deserve that.

“Say it, Oliver,” Tommy says. The warmth of his hand on Oliver’s shoulder makes Oliver want to flinch away. “Just come out and say it.”

“I needed…” he huffs out a breath. “I needed you.”

He’s not unaware of the illogicalness of it all. Tommy had no way of knowing he was alive, or Tommy would have come for him. Same for Felicity. And Oliver’s head knows that neither of them had any idea, but his heart… his _heart_.

Something breaks inside of him. The part that needed his dad while adrift in the ocean, the part that needed his mom as he fell over and sobbed beside her dead body… the part that needed Tommy to _find him_ in Hong Kong. He turns further away from Tommy, hoping the shadows hide the waves of tears.

“I’m sorry,” Tommy says finally. “I’m sorry that happened to you, Oliver. I’m sorry the Gambit went down, I’m sorry about your father, I’m sorry you lost Moira, I’m sorry Ra’s took you… I’m sorry I never found you after you went to face Ra’s. I’m sorry all that happened to you, Oliver. It was awful.”

Oliver didn’t understand grief when Rebecca Merlyn died. He didn’t understand how Tommy felt, and there was a tiny part of him that was anxious for his friend to get back to normal, unknowing—kid that he was—what he recalled as normal would never exist again.

He was about as supportive as a kid of eight could ever be, all things considered, but it probably wasn’t enough. It probably wasn’t what Tommy needed at the time.

But Oliver does remember certain things about the weeks after Rebecca’s death. He remembers lying down on the floor next to Tommy in Oliver’s bedroom, saying nothing, but feeling everything together. He remembers wrapping his arms around Tommy’s shoulders when Tommy woke up crying in the middle of the night.

He remembers standing beside Tommy after the funeral, not sure what to do or say, not even really sure what exactly “dead” was, beyond this weird knowledge that Mrs. Merlyn would never kiss his and Tommy’s foreheads again as she passed them peanut butter sandwiches over the kitchen counter. That she’d never tuck both of them in whenever Oliver slept over, brushing hair back off of their foreheads and wishing them pleasant dreams.

He remembers realizing that he’d never ride in a car with her again, like the time she took him and Tommy to the zoo, and they stayed out so late and were so exhausted from the day that both of them drifted off into slumber in the backseat ten minutes after they left the park. She’d never laugh as she told them to get their hands washed for dinner “quick fast like a bunny rabbit” again.

Oliver remembers how Tommy’s dad took off for God-knows-where and Tommy was alone in a huge house with a housekeeper and a nanny, but really rather alone. He remembers that the week after  Malcolm left, Tommy got into a fistfight at school over something stupid. He remembers how he’d dragged the other boy off of Tommy, how he’d shoved the boy to the ground, grabbed Tommy by the arm and dragged him to the nurse's office, where he sat with Tommy as he held an ice pack to his eye. He remembers how Tommy visibly fought tears while he whispered, “I want my mom.” He recalls how grief had tangled his stomach into a knot as Oliver thought of how Rebecca Merlyn made everything better and happier, and the way Malcolm’s face twisted when he struck Tommy the day before the funeral, and how Oliver’s heart ached when he thought about how Tommy didn’t have a mom anymore.

And in that moment of mutual grief and understanding, Oliver had wrapped his arms around Tommy’s shoulders and replied, “I want your mom too.” Tommy’s face was wet with tears, and Oliver can still remember the way he resisted the embrace for just a moment before he gave in. Looking back at the moment years later, Oliver often wonders if that was the first real hug Tommy received since his mother’s death.

Oliver remembers that moment as the Tommy of the here-and-now wraps his arms around Oliver’s shoulders. He fights off the part of him that wants to shove Tommy away, that wants to run into isolation and lick his wounds. He can’t keep running back to an island every time something is difficult. He can’t shove everyone away, and he doesn’t want to.

Vulnerability hurts, but it’s a hurt Oliver can force himself to bear. He can cope with it for the sake of connection, for the sake of Tommy _here_ , in front of him.

“I wished I was dead,” he says, and he feels Tommy’s body tense at his words. “Everything was too much. It was pointless, it was painful, and I just wanted all the suffering to _end_.”

He sucks in a breath, feeling a bit like Tommy’s presence is the only thing holding him together in this moment. “And I _knew_ I couldn’t die. I knew they would just bring me back. I knew I was trapped in this life and I _hated_ it.”

“I’m sorry,” Tommy says again. “I hate that you were gone. I hate that you felt like that. I hate what they did to you. I hate that it was my father’s fault. I hate it.”

And then, in a tone that’s eerily soft, Tommy says, “You know I killed him for it.”

“I know,” Oliver says, because he _knows_. He knows what Tommy would have done. He knows what Felicity would have done. And some sick, twisted part of him is _glad_.

“He hurt Thea,” Tommy says. “He took you away from me. And even though I could have made him suffer, all I wanted was for him to be _gone_. Wiped away from this earth. Blotted out. Extinguished.”

Tommy pulls back from the hug, and Oliver follows his lead. Their eyes lock on each other, and Oliver thinks that since he’s been back from the island, this is the moment they’ve understood each other the best.

“I needed you too, Oliver,” Tommy says. “I _needed_ you too, and my father’s selfishness took you away from me and away from _her_. And I need you now. Because if the past five years have taught me anything, it’s that the world we live in is dangerous and terrifying, and that the only way to survive it is to have people you trust guarding your back. And I want you at my back. I want my—I want Felicity’s eyes in the sky, and I want you at my back.”

It’s an impulsive move, to reach out and touch Tommy’s neck, but Oliver’s powerless to fight it. He presses his palm to his friend’s neck, splaying his fingers out against his skin. His head bows forward. Their foreheads touch.

“Always,” Oliver says, and for just a moment, just a second, there’s the urge to kiss him. He remembers what it was like before, or thinks he does. But Oliver's too afraid to move. Even when it seems like maybe, just maybe, Tommy's waiting for it.

They stay like that, stilled by the weight of what they’ve just said, of what’s just been promised, and the weight of what they want yet refuse to take. When they break apart, they head for the kitchen without speaking. Tommy digs leftovers out of the fridge. Oliver grabs silverware and plates.

They sit at the counter and eat in silence. After a few minutes, Felicity pads in, wearing a dark purple robe and white bunny slippers. She makes tea. She says little. After a few moments, she climbs up onto Oliver’s lap, wraps her arms around his neck and holds onto him tightly.

She’s soft and sleepy in his arms.

There’s no conversation when Tommy and Oliver take her to bed. Oliver lays her down in the middle of the mattress, just like the previous two nights. He takes one side, Tommy takes the other.

Even though Felicity’s breathing evens out and she drifts off into sleep easily, Oliver doesn’t settle down. He still feels antsy, anxious. He hasn’t come down from the adrenaline rush of being in the field.

He considers his usual options. Taking something that will knock him out sounds unappealing, He doesn’t want to run back to the arrow cave to hit a mannequin a few thousand times, but he could go jogging. He doesn’t really want to leave Felicity, but she’s pretty soundly out, and he knows adrenaline crashes usually hit her hard. She should have a good three or four hours of sleep before she starts to stir.

Carefully, so as not to wake up Felicity, Oliver rolls over. He climbs out of bed and reaches for his running shoes.

He’s only a few feet down the hall when he hears the bedroom door behind him opening again.

“I’m coming with you,” Tommy says.

Silently, Oliver nods his head once. Felicity will sleep. It’ll be okay.

Neither of them talks as they run together. They take one of the long paths through the park, speeding up and slowing down as they need to.

The sun is rising when they return to the apartment together, bodies slick with sweat and chests heaving. They creep into the bedroom, but Felicity’s still sound asleep, curled around a pillow.

Tommy’s the one who sits down on the bed beside her, who draws his fingers across her curls and leans down to kiss her forehead.

Oliver turns away from them and heads to the bathroom. He’s been careful to take baths since he came back from Nanda Parbat. He’s had one too many buckets of ice water thrown over his head, been thrown into too many shower rooms with a cold spray and one bar of soap.

He figures, stupidly, that the way through this is the same way he pushed himself through everything after _Lian Yu_. Put your head down and get through. Survive this the same way he survived the island and the Bratva: Just get through.

The sound of the shower turning on makes a shiver run down his back, but he powers through. He can do this. He _can_. He will.

Oliver steps inside the shower, pulling the curtain closed behind him. He takes a deep breath and reaches down to adjust the water temperature just a little.

He twists too far because the hot fades to cold quicker than he expected.

And just like that, Oliver fades away too.

Somewhere down a distant tunnel, there’s a knocking sound. Knuckles against the bathroom door?

Again. Louder this time. Felicity’s voice. His name. “You alright?”

He can hear the door open, but he can’t move. He can barely breathe. There’s the swish of Felicity pulling back the curtain, and then the next thing Oliver can process is that she’s _there_. She flinches against the cold water and reaches to twist the knob back to warm.

The cold water has drenched her, and her curls have gone flat and bendy with the water. In a daze, Oliver reaches his hands up to touch the wet strands. His lips form her name, but they don’t make a sound.

His world narrows down to the touch of her hands on his shoulders, sliding up his neck, pulling him into her, against her. He hides his face in the bend of her neck, keeps his sobs away from her sight, lets his tears fall onto her skin. Her hands are soft as her fingers sink into his hair.

He’s so distracted by the feel of her that he barely registers the door to the bathroom opening again or someone else stepping into the shower with them. But as Felicity curls up in front of him, from behind, Tommy’s arms wrap around him. Oliver feels Tommy’s cheek resting between his shoulders.

The water pours down. They hold onto him tightly.

Slowly, Oliver settles back into his own skin. He breathes deeply.

He comes home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next update should be July 20th.


	21. PART THREE: CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver has some things he needs to figure out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just have to take a moment to scream about the fact that with this chapter WE HAVE OFFICIALLY CROSSED THE 100K MARK.
> 
> ...okay now back to the fic.

Oliver wakes up to the muffled sound of Felicity’s laughter. He groans as he cracks one eye open, flinching at the burst of sunlight accosting him through the open blinds. Brushing his hand across the sheets beside him reveals that he’s alone in the bed.

He glances at the clock. He has to blink twice at the numbers 10:37 glaring back at him. For just a moment, he thinks the clock must be wrong. He hasn’t voluntarily slept in this late since… damn, since before the Gambit, probably.

Swinging his legs over the side of the bed, Oliver scrubs a hand through his hair. A quick search and he’s found his jeans on the floor. He grabs a shirt from a slightly open dresser drawer. It’s Tommy’s, he realizes as he pulls it over his head. It’s just a little too snug.

Halfway down the apartment hallway, he realizes the second voice mingling with Felicity’s isn’t Tommy’s like he expected it to be.

Oliver turns the corner and there at the counter sit Laurel Lance and Felicity Smoak-Queen-Merlyn, each holding a mug of coffee. They’re laughing like the old friends they are.

Felicity sees him first, lowering her coffee and lurching forward in her chair just a touch, as if stopping herself from moving to greet him,

Laurel has no such hesitation. “Oliver,” she says, and then her arms are around him.

It takes him a moment to react, and then he sighs into her hug. “Hey, pretty bird,” he tells her, the nickname as effortless as ever. He’s vaguely aware of Felicity standing up, of her slipping past them into the living room. Of her giving them space to have this moment.

Laurel shoves herself away from him. Thank God, she doesn’t slap him. “What the _fuck_ were you thinking? Running off to a fight to the death like that.” Her eyes are wet with tears. “What the _fuck_ were you thinking not saying goodbye to me, Oliver Jonas Queen.”

He wasn’t thinking. He was acting. He was saving Thea.

But he should have said goodbye. Laurel matters to him. Laurel is important to him. He should have said goodbye to her the way he said goodbye to Tommy, to Felicity, to Thea. But—

“I thought I was coming back,” he says. It’s partially the truth. He’d certainly _hoped_ he was coming back.

“You still say goodbye, Oliver,” Laurel tells him, her voice cracking on the word ‘goodbye’. “You still _fucking_ say goodbye to me.”

“I’m sorry,” he tells her, and he pulls her in close, holds her tighter. She’s Laurel; she’s one of his people.

“You’re _alive_ ,” she says, speaking the word over him almost like a benediction. “You’re _alive_.”

The way she says it almost makes him believe it.

When she pulls back from the hug, they just stare at each other for a long moment, each taking the other in. Then with a touch on his arm, Laurel guides him back over to the kitchen island and he sits.

“Coffee?” she asks, and it feels odd for her to ask him if he wants something to drink in the place where he’s living, but he nods. She pours him a cup and passes it to him. Then she takes her seat and sips at her own drink.

“Tell me, Oliver,” she says. “Tell me.”

And then, because she’s Laurel, he talks.

He starts with the moment he came back to life, the disorientation, the horror of it all. How in his nightmares he looks up to see Ra’s’ face sneering down at him. How he dreams of black ooze drowning him again and again but because he’s constantly brought back to life he can’t die.

Laurel takes his hand and listens.

Oliver’s had many people fight at his side. He’s had Shado and Slade and Sara. He’s had Diggle and Felicity and Roy, Thea and Tommy.

No one is exactly like Laurel. No one else has that specific brand of toughness and resoluteness that Laurel Lance does. She listens without flinching, instead sitting perfectly still. Rather than being disconcerting, her calmness communicates safety, security. If she were angry or scared or emotional at all, it would break the tenuous bubble around them. It would put Oliver on edge, on alert. Instead, he’s free to speak, because it’s obvious to him that Laurel is willing to stay on-guard for both of them.

That doesn’t mean she feels nothing. She holds all of her own sorrow and sadness inside her, waiting until Oliver has finished saying everything there is to say.

When he’s done, when he tells her about how he killed Ra’s and passed the ring to Nyssa, Laurel taps the fingers of her free hand against the counter. “And then you came home?” she asks.

Oliver glances at the space around him, at the apartment that isn’t his and the furniture that used to be. “Yes,” he says, not sure he’s really put that much agreement into the word. “I did.”

“I’m glad,” she tells him.

“So am I,” Oliver says, and as he does, he believes it just a little bit more than he would have if he’d said the words the day before.

And then, Laurel says the words that have been echoing in Oliver’s brain for the past few days, the ones that haunt him in those anxious moments of quiet and uncertainty: “So what’s next?”

* * *

 

When Felicity leaves Oliver and Laurel in the kitchen to talk, Tommy half hopes she will curl up beside him on the couch. Instead, she grabs her laptop from the coffee table and climbs into her favorite chair. She props the computer up on her knees and starts typing.

Tommy doesn’t bother to mask his disappointment. Now that she’s bounced back from the stress of the night before, Felicity has been running searches and investigating the events that transpired. It’s not an unusual thing for her to do post-mission, but the intensity with which she is doing it is a little strange.

They all came home safe. They got a little girl home to her mother.

“We didn’t _catch_ them,” Felicity says when he asks about it.

Tommy thinks of the bodies strewn across the floors, of the man Oliver shot through the eye, of the groans of the incapacitated men on the ground that SCPD probably hauled off for questioning. “They’re not going to hurt anyone again,” he says.

“No,” Felicity says, “Because all of them are dead.”

That stops Tommy. Sure, Oliver killed to save the girl, but that was to preserve the life of an innocent. Everyone who came at him or Oliver they dispatched of as non-lethally as possible. “What do you mean?” he asks.

“All SCPD found were _bodies_ ,” Felicity says. She turns the laptop around so Tommy can see the screen. With her finger, she tabs through the pictures for him. He recognizes the man Oliver killed—the one who threatened the girl—but as Felicity keeps moving through the pictures, Tommy realizes that while some of the bodies do display signs of a scuffle with the Arrow and the Quarrel, there’s one more insidious similarity between all of the dead mercenaries.

“They were all killed with a sword,” he says quietly.

“I don’t think you were alone in that building,” Felicity says. “I think someone else was there. Someone else was watching. And someone else killed those men, either to keep them from talking to us or to keep them from talking to the SCPD. Or maybe just so the mastermind could keep their own anonymity.”

“Why?” Tommy asks, not really expecting an answer, just asking for the hell of it.

“Not money,” Felicity says. “There was no way that the mother of that girl could have paid a ransom hefty enough to make taking her worth it. If they were going to do… something else unspeakable with her, she would have been _gone_. We know that’s how those trafficking operations work.”

Tommy nods. Human trafficking isn’t very common in Starling—Team Arrow’s presence has made sure of that—but Laurel’s city has a younger vigilante presence.  The trafficking there is insidious, and Laurel’s been burning the candle at both ends, as both the Black Canary and the DA in order to combat it.

“But why take the girl in the way they did if it wasn’t about money?”

“And why kill the hired muscle with a _sword_?” Felicity says.

“To send a message?” he theorizes.

“I think it was a test,” Felicity tells him. “They lured us in, gave us a situation we couldn’t leave alone, and then watched how we took their people out.”

Tommy’s mind races. He wants her over here on the couch. He wants to halve the distance between them because the thoughts in his head are loud and screaming and he wants Felicity in his arms to reassure him that the world is beautiful instead of ugly.

“I’m going to start going through our old missions,” Felicity says. “See if I can pinpoint any times it looks like they’ve done this before.”

“You think they might do it again,” Tommy says. It’s not a question.

“I think if we’re being tested—if we’re being _studied_ —then we need to figure out who is doing it and why. But I also think we need to play this carefully. If they suspect that we know, it might escalate things.” She taps a few keys. “I’ve been trying to see if there was someone else in their system while I was in there. If it was a test, I think it’s possible that they were testing me too.”

Tommy has to focus _very_ hard to unclench his fists at that thought. “Do you think someone knew that the Arrow—the _real_ Arrow—was back in the city?”

Felicity shakes her head, her curls bobbing around her shoulders. “I don’t _know_. Maybe he was a surprise. But whoever this is… they know now.”

Her hands are shaking. She closes her laptop and leans forward to place it on the coffee table. That’s when Tommy moves. He takes a knee in front of her and grabs both her hands in his. “Listen. We’re gonna make it through this.”

“We’re not _focused_. I wasn’t focused. I thought it was—” She swallows and turns her face away. After a moment's pause, she continues. “I thought he was home, and it was over. Malcolm is gone. Ra’s is dead. We’re supposed to get a break now, right?”

“We’re Team Arrow,” Tommy says. “This is what we _do_. If it’s not what we want to do anymore, we need to talk about making that decision together, and then with the team.”

He watches the steel harden in her eyes, the determination set itself in her mouth. “We’re still needed. That little girl _needed_ us, and we saved her.”

 _Would she have been in danger if_ not _for us?_ Is a question neither of them dares to either ask or answer.

“If Oliver—” Felicity glances in the direction of the kitchen. They can hear Oliver and Laurel’s voices, but the words aren’t intelligible. Felicity keeps her voice quiet. “If Oliver decides not to put the hood back on then we reevaluate. But I’m not done. I can’t be.”

She puts her hand to his cheek. “And you?” she asks.

“I’m in this as long as you are.” He turns his head to kiss her palm. “As long as you have me.”

It feels like they’re talking about two things at the same time, but either way, Tommy means what he says.

Felicity looks at him then. _Really_ looks at him. It’s one of those breath-catching, heart stopping moments where her eyes shine at him with nothing less than complete, pure affection. She mouths the words _I love you_ , before she puts her mouth on his.

Dropping Felicity’s hands, Tommy takes only a second to wrap his arms around her and lift her up with him as he rises to his feet. Her mouth feels warm underneath his, soft and sweet. Her curls tickle his cheek; her fingers tug at the material of his shirt to pull him closer. She sways in his arms.

He can get caught up in her so easily, so effortlessly. The world could be crashing down around them—and maybe it is—and all he could think about would be Felicity kissing him.

When she pulls away, just a little, her eyes still hold that same look in them. It’s warmer than star-struck, something approaching love-struck. The smile on her lips is easy, a soft curve behind smudged lipstick. “I got a little lost,” she says, and it’s not an apology, not really. It’s just a confession.

He kisses her nose. “I know.”

With one fingertip, she draws a trail down his sternum, traces his abs lightly over his shirt. He swallows, contemplating taking her hand by the wrist and gently moving it away. “Some things are really, really unfair right now,” she murmurs, and her gaze has fallen away from his face to follow her hand.

“You’re telling me,” he can barely get the words out.

“I didn’t check to make sure you were okay last night,” she says softly, and for a second, the shift throws him. Sometimes Felicity’s brain moves a little quicker than his wants to follow, especially when she’s touching him the way she is.

“I was okay,” he says, still a little too on edge, still a little too focused on Felicity’s palm, pressed to his stomach, above his hipbone.

Her eyes snap back up to his. “Were you?”

“I am okay,” he corrects. He can’t help the flash of concern that fills him when he thinks about that night, about how shaken Felicity was. It distracts him from her touch, but only slightly. “You scared me.”

She nods solemnly. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” he says, and he kisses her.

He pushes a little harder this time, kisses her a bit deeper, with a bit more wanting. It hasn’t been a terribly long time since they’ve had this, but it’s felt like forever. And he wants.

She sighs into him. He imagines her hand sliding past his belt, but she doesn’t move it. He imagines pulling off her shirt, unsnapping her bra, putting his hands on her breasts. But he doesn’t move his hands.

“We knew this was going to be complicated,” she says, voice thready, and he loves that he can do that to her, loves that he can affect her so.

He had. He knew it was going to be complicated. They haven’t talked about the sex part. Felicity’s been careful to de-escalate situations, but that doesn’t mean Tommy hasn’t had his moments of desperate wanting for his wife. It’s been eased by moments where he’s just held her, settled with touches that are intimate yet not erotic.

Tommy closes his eyes and pulls her in tightly to his chest. He presses his chin to the top of her head and breathes in the scent of her shampoo. “Love you,” he whispers.

She sighs into his embrace. “Love you too.”

He steals another kiss. Because he can. Because he loves kissing her. Because it’s not stealing when his wife turns her head back up to him and gives it freely.

When Oliver and Laurel enter the living room a few moments later, Tommy and Felicity are sitting together on the couch. Her legs are tucked over Tommy’s, and she’s nestled very perfectly into his side, with his arm resting on the back of the couch behind her.

She looks up as Oliver approaches, and Tommy watches as she reaches over and sets a hand on the seat beside her. It’s a clear invitation, even if she says nothing, and Oliver accepts it. He sits close beside her, sliding his own arm around her back as she adjusts to find a comfortable position between both of them. Oliver’s hand ends up resting on Felicity’s ribcage, only a few inches away from Tommy’s side.

Tommy looks at Laurel. She’s still holding her mug of coffee, and she slowly lowers herself down to sit on the armrest of the cushioned chair across from them. Her expression is difficult to read, but Tommy catches the uptick of her eyebrows, and the quirk of her lip.

He’s fairly certain he’s thought every thought that must be running through her head, and based on the way her eyes linger on him, he’s pretty sure he’s going to hear all of them at one point or another. While it’s not a conversation he’s anxious for, it’s also not one he’s particularly dreading. Laurel always has a good perspective on things. He might not like what she says, but he wouldn’t dream of going without hearing about it.

Felicity fills Oliver in about what she’s figured out regarding the events of the night before. For Laurel’s sake, she supplies additional details and specifics. Laurel is coming into this issue with an entirely different perspective. Tommy knows the value of that. He knows that _Felicity_ knows the value of it as well.

“What do you think?” Tommy asks Laurel once Felicity’s finished.

Laurel waits a moment before answering. “I think that when we do what we do… we make enemies. I think the better we get at this, the more likely it is that someone will step in to take us down.” Her gaze is hard, and her expression is determined. “But that doesn’t mean we stop fighting. Right now whoever this is has lost his most important advantage: You know they’re coming.”

“We don’t know who they _are_ ,” Felicity points out. “We just know that they’re _watching_.”

Abruptly, Tommy feels her tense.

“They’re watching,” she says. “That’s the one thing we _do_ know.”

Laurel raises an eyebrow. Tommy turns his head to look at Felicity, and the expression in her eyes frightens him just as much as it exhilarates him. There’s a fierce determination on her face, and it’s the kind of look she gets before she proposes something unbelievably dramatic. It’s what her face looks like seconds before she suggests arson, or explosions, or boxing glove arrows. “Let’s shut them out.”

The day takes a wild turn after that. Felicity sends Oliver and Tommy to the lair to sweep it for bugs using her current detection system, while she runs off with Laurel to update her detection equipment.

It doesn’t matter much to Tommy that he fails to understand the intricacies of what happens next. Felicity gives specific directions, and everyone follows along. Roy and Thea show up a few hours in, and they dutifully accept Felicity’s instructions to help clear the area of bugs.

They don’t find a lot, but what they do find is very high quality tech. It has to be, Tommy guesses, in order for it to have escaped Felicity’s more scrutinous security measures.

They circle around the small pile that collects on one of the metal tables. There are three very tiny disks about the size of peas. All of them came in on gear--the motorbike, the sleeve of Thea’s jacket, someone’s boot. Laurel’s theory is that they were planted during with the fight for the kidnapped girl.

“None of these is capable of gathering much,” Felicity explains, holding one between her forefinger and thumb. “I think they were mostly trying to get one close enough to my network in order to crack open a back door and poke around.”

“Do you think they got anything?” Roy asks.

Felicity shrugs. “I keep just about all of the important stuff on the servers over there. It’s a closed system. No way to hack in wirelessly. My guess is they were more interested in our in-field communications. If they’re studying how the team functions, how we respond to circumstances, what calls we make in what situations, then that would be of much deeper interest to them than old evidence and files I’ve collected over the years.”

“So what do we do?” Oliver asks.

“First,” Felicity says, peering intently at the tiny device between her fingers. “I crack these babies wide open and figure out everything I can about where they came from and who may have planted them.”

“And second?” Tommy asks. He leans in over her shoulder, pressing his palm to the small of her back.

Carefully, Felicity sets the bug back on the table with its compatriots. “Then we track them back to their source and take care of the problem.”

* * *

 

With Felicity distracted with recent vigilante developments, Oliver finds himself spinning his wheels a bit. Tommy still has a successful club to manage, Thea and Roy have their own lives, and Laurel leaves for Coast City after a criminal she put away a few months ago stages a jailbreak.

His salvation from boredom comes in the form of John Diggle, who is on a two week leave from ARGUS because of a knee injury. The two of them spend some afternoons at the gun range and one or two at the park watching Delilah play. She brings Oliver dandelions and giggles with delight whenever he tosses her in the air.

“I wish I had good advice for you,” Dig says as Dee laughs her way down the slide and into his arms.  “Your situation is a little bit out of my depth. Frankly, you’re all handling everything way better than I expected.”

Oliver chuckles, but it’s hollow. If anyone could give him the perfect advice, the right and noble answer, it would be John Diggle. If Diggle told Oliver the noble thing to do would be to walk away, Oliver would believe him. That’s just who John _is_. The fact that he admits to a complete lack of answers just highlights how screwed up everything really is.

“Swing!” Dee says, tugging on her dad’s hand. “Swings, Daddy.”

The three of them walk over to the swings, and Dig makes sure Dee is secure in her seat before he starts to push her.

“Look,” Dig says. “All I can tell you is that you three need to keep talking to each other. You need to be a united front against whatever’s coming next.” He turns his attention back to Dee for a few seconds, but then his stare is back on Oliver, intense and severe. “And you, Oliver Queen, need to start living your life again. Whatever that looks like.”

Oliver looks past Dig at the trees that line the playground. “I liked it when living my life looked like _her_. When my future had her in it.”

Dig shrugs. “Who says it doesn’t?”

Oliver looks away. Dee is laughing. She’s clapping her hands as her father pushes her on the swings.

He thinks of a woman a long time ago. Of a phone call. Of an odd ache in his heart. Losing what never really was. Losing a child that never truly came to be.

He thinks of Felicity, and he can see a baby in the swing beside Delilah with wispy blonde curls and beautiful bright eyes.

There are many things that Ra’s has stolen from him, he realizes. Many futures he’ll never see come to pass.

In a blink, the vision in front of him changes. The child’s hair is darker, the eyes still very Felicity. In front of her, Tommy crouches to make faces and kiss her nose as the swing reaches him, and then laugh as Felicity catches the chair from behind to give it another push.

“Who is to say that it _does_ ,” Oliver tells Dig.

“Look.” Dig claps a hand on his shoulder. “Your life isn’t over. Your future is different, sure, but whether or not the three of you can keep going on as you are… whatever Felicity chooses, your life isn’t over.”

Oliver doesn’t want to think that way. He doesn’t want to contemplate a life where it’s not him and Felicity, holding hands until the end of the world. Staying together in spite of danger and strife and pain. Facing down the worst of the worst together.

Living without her is unthinkable.

Except that it’s not. It hurts. It aches deep inside him, a bursting, crippling agony that feels like sandpaper against a too-raw heart.

But Oliver Queen has survived storm and wind and sea. Oliver Queen has survived hunger and cold and fire. He has lived through pain unimaginable, unbearable.

He has lived through death.

And he is still standing.

If loving Felicity has taught him anything, it is that love is still possible for him. Even in a world without her.

Diggle lets the subject drop after that. Oliver has always appreciated that about Diggle, appreciated the way he knows when to push and when to step back. They talk about what Oliver missed during his time away, but not for long. They talk about ARGUS, and the fact that Dig and Lyla are talking about where Dee should attend preschool.

“Man,” Diggle says as they head back to their vehicles—to Dig’s silver SUV and Oliver’s motorbike. “It’s been hell without you, you know.”

Oliver feels his lips lift in a smile. “I know the feeling.”

They hug. It’s firm, but not terribly lengthy. Oliver lifts Delilah up into his arms and smacks a kiss to her cheek. She laughs and pats his face with her little hands.

“And Oliver,” Diggle says as he straps Dee into her car seat and passes her a sippy cup, “I hope everything works out the way you want it to.”

Oliver notices that he doesn’t say ‘between you and Felicity’, and he thinks that Diggle has really always been the wisest out of all of them.

Back at the apartment, Oliver finds Tommy poring over a stack of paperwork. Inventory for the bar, financial sheets, and payroll all lie scattered across the counter in the kitchen. Tommy’s hair is mussed, like he’s been raking his hands through it for most of the day. He barely looks up when Oliver enters the kitchen, heading for the fridge and the carton of milk inside.

Oliver reaches for the milk, but finds that his hand lands on two beers instead. He grabs them both, uncapping them with the opener in the drawer beside the sink and offering one over the counter to Tommy.

It takes a beat for Tommy to look up at him. He takes the beer. “Thanks.”

Oliver nods. “Take a break,” he says. It’s an offer, not a question. Tommy takes a long swig of the beer and follows Oliver into the living room.

They both end up on the couch, feet propped up on the coffee table, beers in hand. They don’t say much as they drink.

“Dig doing alright?” Tommy asks.

Oliver nods. “He’s good.” He fills Tommy in on the preschool debacle, on ARGUS, on Diggle’s thoughts about their mysterious enemy out there, watching them.

“I was thinking about Thea at the park today,” Oliver says.

“Yeah,” Tommy takes a quick swig of beer. “Her fifth birthday party, I think?”

That wasn’t what Oliver had been thinking of, but he follows the memory anyway. He remembers a pinata—maybe a unicorn?—and a horrifying clown, and feeling entirely too old for the festivities at hand. He and Tommy would have been around fifteen.

“You threw me in the fountain,” Tommy says with a half-hearted laugh.

They’d had a disagreement. Oliver can’t even really remember what it was about. The whole day is a bit fuzzy like that. But he does remember it ended with a hard shove, Tommy too close to the water’s edge, his best friend coming up sputtering. and the words _I swear to God, Oliver fucking Jonas Queen, I will end you_.

It was melodramatic at the time. It probably becomes even more so in hindsight.

They made up again though, because Oliver and Tommy were very good at fighting and making up again. Especially since it was usually Oliver’s fault.

“I was thinking about Thea and Roy,” Oliver clarifies. “Did you know they’re dating?”

“Each other?” Tommy says without looking up. “Kinda hard to miss.”

“No,” Oliver says. “Someone else. They’re both dating the _same_ someone else.”

Tommy looks up. He doesn’t say anything for a long moment. Then, “Huh.” And right back to his beer.

“You knew?” Oliver asks, in an attempt to clarify.

“Yeah,” Tommy says. “I know. She told me. It seems to be working well for them.”

He’d hoped for more than that. He’d hoped for… Oliver isn’t sure. A suggestion. A revelation. Understanding. A sign that maybe Tommy was thinking of the same thing Oliver was—a kiss on a bed that started too late and ended too soon. A road never traveled. A desire never spoken. A thought unthought.

But Oliver sees the tick of Tommy’s jaw, the way he can’t seem to turn and look at Oliver. And Oliver understands that whatever is going to happen next, Tommy won’t be the one to say it. He can’t.

“Maybe I’m selfish,” Oliver says. “Maybe I’m the most selfish person in existence. But when it comes right down to it, I can’t say I disagree with Felicity.”

Tommy stares at him, his expression sliding away from afraid into something resembling hopeful. “What do you mean?”

Oliver summons courage he previously didn’t believe existed, and says, “I don’t know how to do anything other than want both of you.”

Tommy leans forward to set his beer bottle down on the coffee table. “You can’t _say_ shit like that to me, Oliver.”

“Why?” Oliver asks. It’s a little bit of a challenge. “Why can’t I?”

He sits perfectly still, waiting for an answer. Waiting for _anything._

Tommy’s the one who moves, placing his hands firmly on Oliver’s shoulders, mouth hot and wet over his. Tommy the one who bites lightly at his lip, and Oliver groans, grabbing at Tommy’s shirt and tightening his grip.

If kissing Felicity is like drowning, kissing Tommy is like burning alive. It’s fire and flame. It consumes every part of him, a burning, burning, burning in his chest for more, for deeper. It’s a desperate gasp as lips realign and mouths open deeper.

Oliver sinks back onto the couch, accepting the weight of Tommy’s body over him easily, accepting the weight of the moment even as he disappears somewhere inside it, lost in sensation. Tommy’s day-old scruff rasps against his face. His calluses are rough against Oliver’s skin as he runs his hands down his arms.

It could feel sudden. It certainly feels intense. But the only description that rises to the forefront of Oliver’s mind is _inevitable_.

Tommy starts to pull away, but Oliver slides his hand behind his neck and pulls him back down. They kiss fervently. They trade kisses like other people might trade blows: back and forth, each looking for an edge over the other. Trying to best the other.

But who is winning and who is losing is a question lost in the way Oliver keeps lifting his hips in search of friction and the way Tommy is groaning into Oliver’s mouth in-between kisses.

“That,” Tommy says, breath harsh against Oliver’s lips, eyes dark and pupils blown, “Is why you can’t say those things to me.”

“Fuck,” Oliver gasps, need and desperation making the word strangled and sharp as the edge of a blade, but he’s already lifting his head and Tommy is already lowering his lips back down to Oliver’s.

Frantically, Oliver’s hands grip at Tommy’s shirt, tugging, pulling, desperate. Tommy’s skin is warm under his hands. He traces his fingertips across Tommy’s abs, sliding his hands up to his pecs. Ducking his head, Tommy lets Oliver pull off his shirt and toss it aside. He presses his lips to Oliver’s throat, sucking and biting at his skin as Oliver lets his jaw fall open and his eyes drift shut.

One of Tommy’s hands falls to Oliver’s belt, then drifts further down, applying just enough pressure and friction to make Oliver practically whimper beneath his touch.

“Tommy,” Oliver nearly chokes on the name. “Please.”

“Fuck, Oliver,” Tommy murmurs against his skin.

Yes, Oliver thinks. Fuck Oliver. Desperately, he turns his head, catching another kiss, moaning into Tommy’s mouth, grinding against his hand, _please, yes, please, more_ quickly becoming the only thoughts in his brain. The only thoughts other than _Tommy_.

The front door opens. Oliver isn’t lost enough that his ears can’t register the sound, but his brain doesn’t comprehend it as a reason to slow down, as a reason to stop, until he hears Felicity’s voice.

He can hear her say Tommy’s name, and his mind echoes it. Felicity’s voice saying Tommy’s name, how perfect.

Then it’s his own name, and there’s a twinge of concern in her tone this time. And god, Felicity saying his name while Tommy’s tongue is in his mouth sends a burst of pleasure firing across every nerve in his body.

“Oh,” Felicity’s voice says, and in his head, Oliver agrees.

But then Tommy jerks away, shoving himself back to the other end of the couch, bare chest rising and falling as he breathes heavily.

Stunned and disoriented, Oliver begins to sit up. Behind Tommy, he can see Felicity in the doorway, her hand over her mouth. Her eyes are wet with tears, and Oliver’s heart twists at the sight.

Tommy doesn’t turn to look at her. He runs a hand through the dark locks of his hair, and the sight does things to the blood rushing through Oliver’s veins. But his body’s response is tempered by his heart’s concern, and in this moment his heart’s concern is for Felicity.

He watches as she takes a step in their direction, then seems to second-guess herself. Oliver reaches out a hand, and she comes. She finds a seat on the couch between them, and Oliver leans forward to wrap himself around her. He sees her reach a hand out for Tommy, and he watches as Tommy takes it in response.

“I think,” Felicity says finally, and she nuzzles her face against Oliver’s as she does. “That we need to talk.”

She turns then, leaning in to Tommy. He presses his forehead to hers. “I don’t think we can do that right now.”

No, Oliver knows. They can’t. Everything is too heightened right now. It’s all too much. His body knows what it wants, but his head and heart are confused, muddled by desire and emotion.

Tommy takes a kiss from Felicity, cupping her face with his hands. When their lips part, Felicity turns to Oliver. The kiss she gives him lingers in a different way.

“I know what I want,” she tells Oliver. Or maybe she’s telling them both, but her eyes are on Oliver. “I’ve known… somewhere inside me I’ve known almost the whole time. I just didn’t want to acknowledge it. And I wanted to be sure it was something you both wanted.”

Oliver nods. He realizes suddenly that she’s looking at him because she always had an idea about Tommy, but she was never sure about him. He almost smiles at her.

And then he leans over Felicity to kiss Tommy. Tommy responds eagerly, cupping his cheeks, pressing his body forward.

And really who the _fuck_ needs to talk in this moment, Oliver thinks. Talking is overrated. Talking is complicated.

But Tommy is pulling back gently, stroking his thumb across Oliver’s cheek. “She’s right,” he says. “We should talk. All three of us.”

When it’s presented like that, Oliver can’t find that he disagrees. His body is slower to line up with that agreement, however.

“Can we get food while we talk?” Felicity asks softly. “I’m starving.”

Oliver can’t hide his smile. His Felicity. Still forgetting to eat when she’s got a mystery to solve.

“Yeah,” Tommy tells her. He kisses the nape of her neck. “We can get food.”

“Good.” Felicity bends over and snatches his shirt from the floor and shoving it at Tommy’s chest. “Now put your shirt on.” ~~~~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea when the next chapter is happening. But it IS happening. I promise.


	22. PART THREE: CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felicity having walked in on Oliver and Tommy kissing leads to some life-defining conversations.

Tommy sits on the couch, dumbstruck. His body is still humming with arousal, still aching from want, but he obeys Felicity’s order and pulls his shirt on over his head. He shoves his arms through the sleeves and tries to think.

“Chinese?” Felicity asks softly. She’s pulled out her phone and is tapping on the screen, probably looking up the restaurant's number. Tommy can’t even think about food. His stomach is lodged somewhere near his throat.

“The usual,” he manages to choke out. Felicity might be handling this well, and Oliver might be nodding along with Tommy as he rubs Felicity’s shoulders, but Tommy’s only a few seconds away from running for the hills.

Oliver does not want him like this, he reminds himself. Oliver never has. The drunken kiss they shared years ago was a moment of curiosity, nothing more.

But that’s a hard truth to remember when just minutes ago Oliver was coming undone beneath his touch, when Oliver was the one pulling him in for another kiss, and then another one after that.

Felicity stands up, putting her phone to her ear to place the order as she walks away.

Tommy steals a glance at Oliver. His hand is clenched tightly around the armrest of the couch. He isn’t looking at Tommy.

“Oliver,” Tommy tries. “I-” The words feel heavy in his mouth.  _ I’m sorry _ isn’t right. He’s not sorry. And he doesn’t think he needs to be. Oliver kissed him back.

Felicity turns towards them, giving them both a look Tommy struggles to interpret. But then she heads for the kitchen, and he realizes her intention may be to give him and Oliver another moment.

“That was…” It was too many things. Tommy can’t put it into words. It was everything he wanted spread out in front of him. Oliver. Felicity. His wife. Her husband. His friend. His lover.

Everything.  _ Everything _ .

“We need to talk,” Oliver finally says. “She’s right about that. You and I would throw ourselves right into this and burn it all down before we even knew what it was. What it  _ is _ .”

“What is it, Oliver?” Tommy asks. “Because I know who I am. I know what I want. I know  _ who _ I want. That didn’t change the first time I slept with another man.” He almost can’t believe those words came out of his mouth. Oliver knows that he had a one night stand with another guy in college, but Oliver doesn’t know why it ended. Or at least, Tommy never told him. Tommy never told him he only slept with women after that because with women he never got distracted thinking about  _ Oliver _ . 

“Who I am didn’t change when I married a woman, because I knew I was in love with… because I love both of you. But you? I was never someone you wanted. Not like this.”

“You’re in love with m—” Oliver’s head turns sharply in Tommy’s direction. “That’s not—” 

Tommy catches the clench of Oliver’s jaw, the bob of his Adam’s apple as he swallows.

“That’s not true,” Oliver says. He gestures to the space on the couch between them. “I wanted that. I just didn’t realize it until I had it.” 

He turns away. “I’m an idiot.”

Tommy doesn’t exactly disagree. 

“The food will be here in twenty minutes or so,” Felicity says as she walks back into the room. Abruptly, she stops. “Am I interrupting? Do you want me to go…”

“No,” they both say at the same time. Both of them jerk forward as they say the word, halfway rising to their feet. Felicity takes a quick step back.

Tommy holds out his arm, palm out, like he’s trying to talk down a scared animal or a bad guy with a gun. “Stay,” he says quickly. “Stay, sweetheart, please.” He glances at Oliver, whose expression is so pure and vulnerable it almost makes Tommy’s heart stop. “We need to talk.”

Felicity nods. She crosses around the coffee table, shoves aside a stack of magazines, and gingerly sits down. Oliver lowers himself back onto his corner of the couch. Tommy takes the other side. In this way, Felicity is between them both, and they’re facing her. 

Tommy scoots forward enough to place his hand over her knee. She rests her own on top of it.

Considering the fact that they all unanimously agree they need to have a talk, none of them seem to know what they want to say. Silence reigns for a long moment. Oliver reaches forward to take Felicity’s other hand, and Tommy finds himself setting his own free hand on Oliver’s shoulder.

Peace descends over the three of them. Holding onto each other. A private moment of quiet. The calm in the middle of the storm. 

“Here’s what I know,” Felicity says finally. “I love you. Both of you. More than I ever imagined I could ever love anyone. I want—” Her eyes fill with tears, but she keeps going. “I want this. Us. The  _ three _ of us. You and you and me. That’s where I am. That’s where my  _ heart _ is.”

Her eyes catch Tommy’s, then glance over to Oliver. “What about you?”

Tommy’s heart skips a beat as he waits for Oliver to answer. He’s afraid, right down to his bones, that Oliver will say that he just wants Felicity. Only Felicity.

“I want this to work,” Oliver says finally. “I don’t want to lose either of you. I… I think I want to see what the three of us look like as an  _ us _ .”

He turns to Tommy. “If you believe me when I say that I want you. I want this. I do.”

“And you?” Felicity asks Tommy. “What do you want?”

“You,” he says without a second of hesitation. “Both of you. In every way that you would have me.”

He glances at Oliver. He can still feel the press of his lips and the touch of his hands. “In  _ every _ way,” he says again, so that there is absolutely no confusion.

“Okay,” Felicity says. “So then where do we go from here? I know I would really like to have both of you… in every way.” She looks at Tommy as she repeats the phrase he used. “I’m pretty sure that’s something you both would like as well.” She takes a deep breath, and then speeds up a bit. “I mean I think you’d both like to have sex with me, I just don’t know how the other one will feel about knowing both of you are having sex with me.”

They both stare at her. “God, I miss sex,” Felicity suddenly blurts out.

Tommy makes a strangled sound, like something halfway between a cough and a laugh. “I’m… sorry.”

Oliver’s face is turned away, probably so Felicity can’t see his huge smile.

She gives Tommy’s hand a squeeze. “Anyway. Thoughts?”

Only a thousand. 

Tommy slowly slides his hand up her knee, his fingers splaying just slightly underneath the hem of her short skirt. “There are ways,” he tells her, moving closer, using his hand in hers to tug her to him. “There are  _ ways _ , Felicity.”

Oliver seems to have caught onto what Tommy is saying, because he’s moving in too, lifting Felicity’s hand to his mouth so he can kiss the inside of her wrist.

“Oh,” Felicity says, right before Tommy leans in to kiss her. He doesn’t move all the way, just leans in enough so that she falls into the kiss like gravity has pulled her in. 

“Oh,” she murmurs again. She turns her head, letting Tommy bite at her earlobe and kiss beneath her jaw. That her lips are free means that Oliver can claim them, and Tommy sighs against Felicity’s skin as Oliver does just that.

Tommy presses a hand to Felicity’s chest, drawing his finger down the v of her neckline until he reaches the first button. He flicks three of them open with nimble fingers, skimming his nails across the lace of her now-exposed bra. Felicity shudders, shivers, but doesn’t stop kissing Oliver.

“So gorgeous,” Tommy tells her. He’s reached the bottom button now, and Felicity pulls her hands away from Oliver to help Tommy slide the shirt off of her shoulders. Her bra unclasps in the front, and Tommy helps her wiggle out of that too.

Oliver’s gotten distracted kissing down Felicity’s neck, and with her bra out of the way, he makes for her breasts, cupping one with his hand, flicking at her nipple with his thumb. He puts his mouth on the other.

Tommy goes back to kissing Felicity. She’s soft, and warm, and pliant. From this angle, he can push her back a little, lower her gently onto the coffee table. Oliver follows the movement. Tommy is careful as he leans over her, brushing her hair back and smiling down at her before he kisses her again.

He can feel Oliver move away from her breasts, and for a second he’s not sure what’s happening. But then Felicity’s hips rise off of the table, and he realizes that Oliver is pulling at her skirt. Her panties come off with it.

Goosebumps break out across her skin, contrasting the hot flush in her cheeks.

“Please,” she whispers, and she’s looking at Tommy. Neither of them has touched her where she surely must want it at this point, and he’s not surprised that she’s a little desperate. “Please,” she says again, but she doesn’t look to Oliver.

Tommy does. Oliver’s on his knees, and he’s stroking his hands up and down her thighs, but he’s not touching her where she wants it either.

“Touch her,” Tommy says, and Oliver doesn’t even hesitate before his fingers are on Felicity’s sex. Tommy doesn’t bother to watch his technique. He’s too distracted by the way Felicity gasps, lifting her hips even as Tommy presses his palm to her abdomen. 

“Stay still,” he tells her. “Stay still and take it.”

“Kiss me then,” she says, and he does. As he kisses her, he can feel her fingers brush against his stomach, then drop down to his belt. She bites at his lip gently, and starts to work her hand beneath his waistband.

“Felicity,” he says against her mouth. “Felicity.”

He’s not sure what Oliver does, but suddenly she’s tearing her lips from his in order to let out one of the greatest sounds Tommy’s ever heard in his life. A glance down reveals that Oliver’s head is between Felicity’s legs. 

“Shit shit shit,” she hisses, grabbing at Oliver’s hair and  _ yanking _ . “Not so  _ much _ .”

He pulls his head back to look up at her. The strangest pulse of arousal jolts through Tommy at the expression on Oliver’s face. It’s not arrogance or pride. It’s calm. It’s open. It’s tenderness and affection.

Oliver turns his head to kiss her thigh, and that’s when Tommy sees his fingers moving inside her. He watches, enraptured by the rhythm and movement.

“You like that,” Felicity whispers. She grinds just a bit against Oliver’s hand as if to prove her point. “You like watching him touch me.”

His silence is clearly enough of an answer, because he’s too distracted by Oliver leaning in to return his tongue to Felicity’s clit to pay attention to the fact that Felicity is unbuckling his belt. When he does register what her hands are doing, Tommy reaches for her wrists.

“This is about you right now,” he tells her.

She squirms. His hold on her wrists is loose enough that she doesn’t really have to struggle against him to free them. Returning to her earlier goal of shoving down his pants, Felicity tells him, “This  _ is _ about me.”

“Fuck,” Tommy says, or thinks, or wants, because then her soft hands are around the length of him and he can’t concentrate on anything except the way she’s touching him and the way Oliver is touching  _ her _ .

He’s not going to last long, but then, neither is she. He can tell by the sounds she’s making and the unfocused, lazy way she’s stroking him.

Felicity comes first. She drops her hands from Tommy to ball them into fists and press them against her mouth as she shudders because of Oliver’s tongue and fingers.

Tommy brushes her hair away from her sweat-slick face, and she grabs onto his arm, clinging tightly to him as she comes down.

“Fuck, Oliver,” she groans, reaching down to grab him by the hair again. Anticipating what she wants—she wants to kiss Oliver; she does this frequently with Tommy when he goes down on her—Tommy moves back to let her drag him up for a kiss. 

He’s hard and aching, but watching Felicity kiss Oliver does similar things to watching Oliver fuck her with his fingers. He can’t pull his eyes away from how she lifts her legs to press her heels against Oliver’s back, or how she strokes her hand down his neck and across his shoulder blade.

When she pulls back, she looks past Oliver to Tommy. Their eyes meet. He watches as she puts both hands on Oliver’s shoulders, and pushes him towards Tommy.

Oliver doesn’t even hesitate before he kisses him. And just like that all the heat between them is back.

Tommy grabs for Oliver’s belt; Oliver’s hands pick up where Felicity’s left off. His hands are rougher, and his touch is more uncertain, but Tommy doesn’t care.

Tommy wants more. So much more than just their hands on each other, but need and desire are immediate and consuming, and there will be time later. Besides, above all what he really wants is Oliver, and Oliver is right here, responding to his touch, moaning into his mouth, using his hands to make Tommy even more desperate than he was a few moments ago. 

The kiss breaks, but Tommy keeps their foreheads pressed together. He keeps his eyes closed. 

One of Felicity’s hands strokes down his spine. Oliver’s hand speeds up just slightly; his rhythm faltering, his breathing harsh.

Tommy lets his head fall forward onto Oliver’s shoulder and cries out his name as he comes with a gasp. Oliver clings to him. Felicity’s hand joins Tommy’s, and Oliver hits his own climax a few moments later, his grip tightening on Tommy as he practically whimpers his way through it.

They collapse onto each other, the three of them, naked and sweaty and sticky, but a lovely mess all the same. Felicity is between them, pressed against both their bodies, but Tommy can still look Oliver in the eye, still reach over Felicity’s body and take Oliver’s hand.

Felicity touches Tommy’s cheek. “We still have to talk,” she says.

“I know,” Tommy tells her. “We will. I promise. Let’s just… let’s take a minute.”

She sighs. It’s contentment and peace, and Tommy smiles as she closes her eyes and snuggles into their embrace. “Fine with me,” she says. “But in a few minutes one of you is going to have to pay the delivery guy and take the food.”

Oliver is the one who sits up. “Shit,” he says. “I forgot.”

Felicity laughs, and tugs him back down into the cuddle pile. “I almost did too.”

They’ve just finished getting dressed and cleaned up when there’s a knock at the door. Tommy answers it, passing the young guy a hundred in exchange for the bag of chinese.

Felicity nearly attacks him in the hallway so she can break into her crab rangoon. They forgo plates, instead grabbing folded containers and chopsticks. They could, if they wanted, head back into the living room, but instead there’s a mutual, silent decision to stay in the kitchen. Perhaps to keep them a little more focused this time around, Tommy’s not sure.

It’s clear that Felicity is determined to actually do some talking this time. She sits out of arm’s reach of both of them and taps her fingers on the table as she eats her Kung Pao chicken. She’s the one who starts outlining things, presenting ideas. 

She likes the idea of them sharing the same bed from now on. Oliver and Tommy both nod in agreement at that idea. Tommy is almost ready to suggest buying a bigger bed.

“We need boundaries,” Felicity says. “We need guides for communication. We need—” Her voice breaks. “We need to do this right because I can’t lose either one of you.”

It’s Oliver who reaches across the table, who takes her hand even as she subtly flinches away. “I don’t think any of us can, Felicity.”

“That means we need to  _ talk _ ,” she says. “Even when it’s hard, or complicated, or when it hurts us. We can’t bottle things up; we can’t let fear or jealousy build up inside us.”

“We’re…” Tommy clears his throat. “We’re  _ it _ , right? I don’t want… I don’t want to date or sleep with or kiss anyone else. Just the two of you.”

Felicity looks at Oliver. They share a non-verbal exchange, and then they both nod. “Agreed,” Oliver says. “This is the three of us.”

“Just us three,” Felicity agrees. Then, with a smile, she says, “I think two husbands is enough for me.”

Her husbands manage to laugh at that. 

“What about the two of you?” Felicity asks. “What do you need from this?”

Tommy has to think about it for a moment. He’s a little out of practice as far as paying attention to his own needs is concerned. He’s not sure what he needs, beyond Felicity and Oliver.  

“I need to know I’m not the odd one out,” he says finally. “I can’t be the interloper in my own marriage, and I don’t want to be. And if that’s… if that’s what’s going to happen, then I am out.”

Felicity’s face falls. Tommy’s only ever seen her so heartbroken in the days right after Oliver died. Instant, vicious regret fills him. He didn’t mean  _ her _ . He didn’t mean to hurt her by sharing the truth, he just found himself vocalizing his own fears without really thinking about the various possible interpretations of his words.

“Never,” Oliver says with a fierceness that lands like a punch in Tommy’s gut. “Never. You’re not—”

Oliver flinches and looks away. “We’re partners,” he says. “The three of us. We’re  _ partners _ . We have to be. That’s the only way this is going to work.”

Felicity reaches for his hand, and now she’s holding onto him and Oliver. “Never, never, never my second choice,” she reminds him, lifting his hand to her lips to kiss his palm and press his hand to her cheek. “Never ever. You help us if we ever make you feel that way.”

Tommy grabs Oliver’s hand, and they sit like that for a minute, connected, united. “What about you?” Tommy asks Oliver. “What do you need?”

Tommy half expects the answer to be Felicity, but instead he’s surprised when Oliver’s answer is: “Tommy.”

Tommy suddenly finds all of his attention on Oliver, the soft look in his eyes, the tightness of his grip on Tommy’s hand, the flush to his cheeks. 

Oliver clears his throat. “This is new,” he says. “It’s new, and it terrifies me, but it also exhilarates me, because I feel like I’m finally putting actions behind feelings that have been part of me for  _ years _ . I want to be able to understand that more and...”

He looks at Felicity, and Tommy follows Oliver’s gaze. There are tears on Felicity’s cheeks, but a smile on her lips. “...I know you love me,” Oliver tells her. “That was never a question, Felicity.”

“I get it,” Tommy hears himself saying. “This is new. We’re new. And we need to figure out what that means.”

“You will,” Felicity promises. “I… I love you both so much. I was so scared at the beginning of all this that your relationship would be destroyed, and that would have killed me. I  _ need _ you two together. In a way, all of Starling does. Because whatever we’re facing next, I think the both of you need the other to have your back.”

The conversation slips, then, into the progress that’s been made on finding the identity of their mystery adversary.

“What my concern is,” Felicity says, dropping both their hands so she can go back to her chopsticks. “Is that maybe whoever this is was also trying to break into Penelope.”

“Penelope?” Oliver asks, and Felicity laughs. It’s a glorious sound.

“I hadn’t named her then,” she says. “I’ve named her now. Remember my highly advanced algorithm for breaking into classified networks all over the world?”

Oliver nods.

“I named her Penelope,” Felicity explains, as if it’s as simple as that.

“She also greatly expanded Pen’s functionality,” Tommy says.

“She learns fast,” Felicity says. “Went from breaking into systems to becoming one of the largest treasure troves of data in the world. She analyses crime patterns, makes connections between various organizations… she’s incredible.”

“You made her.” There’s a strong touch of pride in Oliver’s voice. As if he’s unable to comprehend the idea that Felicity could make anything less than something incredible.

“And you think this person was after Penelope?” Tommy asks.

“It’s a theory.” Felicity says. “I also managed to find the signature on those bugs. They’re from Palmer Tech.”

One of Queen Consolidated’s main competitors. Tommy has to fight the urge to fight that insufferable Ray Palmer right in the jaw. Maybe that would make the man shut up and stop dropping hints to Thea about merging the companies. He’s brilliant, Tommy knows, but he’s also an ass.

“You’re gonna have to fill me in,” Oliver says. “Who’s running QC right now?”

“The board,” Felicity says. “And Thea.” 

Mostly Thea, Tommy knows. And damn if she’s not good at it. The girl can hold up her own against a slew of stuffy men in suits. And Tommy knows his stuffy men in suits. He knows her skill and shrewdness is more down to the fact that for the first six months she had nightly calls with Walter, sometimes for  _ hours _ , and the fact that she started taking business classes online in her downtime. But when the majority of QC’s shares were dropped in her lap—her’s and Felicity’s—the answer to the question of who should take over the company was obvious.

There’s that flash of pride in Oliver’s expression again. But his mind is clearly set on the problem at hand, because he says, “Is someone at Palmer Tech out to get us?”

“Not that I’m aware of,” Felicity leans forward on the table a bit. “Raymond is a little much, but he’s not… malicious in any way. Not really. Socially awkward in a way that initially presents as malicious, which is creepy as hell.”

Tommy doesn’t disagree with her there. He’s not exactly Ray Palmer’s biggest fan, not after seeing the way the guy uses his own technology to spy on people and gain the upper hand in both business and personal interactions.

But Palmer’s never shown any interest in the Arrow, or Quarrel, or any of them, really. He’s spoken out in public in defense of them, if Tommy remembers correctly.

“No,” he says. “Palmer’s only issues with us rise from QC and Palmer Tech being competitors. He tried to buy out Merlyn Global before Stellmoor intervened.” And holy hell, that was one of the worst things that could have happened to his Father’s Legacy. Stellmoor kept the Merlyn name, and the company is thriving under the direction of one Isabel Rochev.

Tommy’s long since sold his shares in MG. His assets are well protected and earning him massive returns elsewhere while he manages Verdant and begins to venture out into other properties. Turns out Malcolm was wrong about a lot of things, and Tommy’s business acumen was one of the biggest.

“So someone connected to Palmer Tech?” Oliver theorizes. “Someone in the company who disagrees with the work we do?”

“Maybe in their R&D department,” Felicity agrees. “I’m in their system and scanning their employees right now. It’s just taking Penelope some time to sift through the data and spit out some likely candidates. Then we can, oh, how would you put it Oliver? Find the person, and put the fear of God into them until they talk.”

Oliver’s eyes sparkle with delight, and it’s clear to Tommy that he’s missing out on a private joke. But it doesn’t bother him like it might have before.

“Sounds like a plan,” Tommy says.

Felicity uses her teeth to help her rip open the wrapping around a fortune cookie. “It’s a start.”

“Huh,” Felicity says as she breaks open her cookie and unfurls the little piece of paper. “I’ve gotten this one before.”

Oliver gently takes it from her hands. “Rejoice with new beginnings?”

“Not bad advice,” Tommy says. “As far as fortune cookies go.”

“No,” Felicity agrees, looking from him to Oliver. “Not bad at all.”

* * *

 

Felicity is woken up in the middle of the night by a quiet tone sounding on her phone. It doesn’t disturb Oliver or Tommy when she carefully crawls out of bed. She grabs her phone and her tablet, and sneaks into the living room. 

The results of her searching through Palmer Tech’s records are in, and there are three probable suspects. Felicity pulls together dossiers on all of them, and then leans back on the couch, wrapping a throw blanket around her shoulders. Part of her wants to crawl back in bed to try and achieve a few more hours of sleep, but another part of her is a little too wired, her brain moving a bit too quickly now that she’s woken it up. Sleep’s not going to be an easy thing for her to find for a while.

Instead, she takes her phone and taps out a quick message.  _ You awake? _

_ Yeah _ , comes the reply a few moments later.  _ Need to talk? _

Felicity hits the dial button without bothering to compose a reply.

“Hey,” Thea says, her voice a little sleepy. “How’s everything?”

“Are you sure I didn’t wake you?” Felicity asks. 

“I’m sleepy,” Thea says, “But I wasn’t asleep.”

She doesn’t explain further, and Felicity fills in the blanks. She hates that Thea’s experience with her biological father is still haunting her years later, but at the same time she knows better than to push. Thea will talk if she needs to.

“I think I need advice,” Felicity says. “Specific advice.”

Thea laughs. “How specific are we talking here?”

Felicity pauses. She’s not sure how to put into words the events of the day. She’s not sure how much detail to give Thea.

She stays quiet longer than she plans, because suddenly Thea’s asking, “Felicity? Are you there? Is something wrong?”

“No,” Felicity says. “Nothing’s wrong. Everything’s good.”

Too good. Too-good-to-be-true-good. Felicity clears her throat. “I think… I think we all came to a decision today.”

Thea’s quiet. Felicity doesn’t know what else to say, so she takes a shaky breath. “And I’m still trying to process it.”

“Who?” Thea asks, and Felicity hears a crack of emotion in her voice, “Who did you—who did you pick?”

Felicity’s breath catches. “Oh, Thea, sweetie, no, it wasn’t like…”

But Thea continues, “I mean I knew you… you’re not, you’re not  _ me _ , and even if you were it’s not like  _ they _ would have been too, but I still… there was a chance… I was  _ hoping _ .”

“Thea,” Felicity says. “Thea, I chose  _ both _ .”

Felicity can hear her gasp. “I chose both,” she repeats. “And they did too, and now I am  _ terrified _ that I am going to screw this up, or that they are or… I’m not even sure what I’m afraid of anymore.”

“Wow,” Thea whispers. “Wow. How did that happen, even?”

“I came home and Oliver and Tommy were…” Felicity takes a second to figure out how to end that statement. “...kissing,” she finally decides on, even though from what she saw, they were quite a few steps past that.

“Okay, that’s enough information,” Thea says quickly. Then, in a softer tone, she continues, “I’m so happy for you, Felicity.”

And isn’t  _ that _ a surreal statement, Felicity thinks. But that’s how she feels too. Happy. Elated. Like she’d been given  _ both _ of them back in their entirety, with nothing held back. Not anymore.

Maybe not ever again.

“I don’t know how this  _ works _ ,” Felicity tells her. “I don’t know how any of this works.”

“It works how you want it to,” Thea says. “Roy, Sin, and I, we’re much more flexible than the three of you will probably want to be. I know you; you like certainties. You like assurances, promises. You need to talk out the guidelines and negotiate the issues. And that’s good. That’s  _ great _ , especially with those two boneheads. But I can’t  _ give _ you those guidelines. All I can do is just tell you how it works for us.”

“How does it work?” Felicity asks. “We’ve never really talked about it.”

“I have a boyfriend and a girlfriend,” Thea says. “We go on dates with the three of us, we go on dates where there are just two of us. They go out without me. I kiss both of them. They kiss each other. We cuddle; we say I love you; we support and respect and love each other. Sin knows what we do at night. She knows that some nights I just...” Thea clears her throat. “Some nights I just need her to hold me.”

Felicity knows all this. She’s seen all this. 

“Sin doesn’t usually want to have sex with us,” Thea continues, and Felicity has to hold back a noise of surprise. “She will have sex with us sometimes. She knows we’re attracted to her, but sex for her is just… it’s more about emotional connection. It’s not physical need. Most of the time she just wants to hold us after, or hold one of us during, but she’s really not that big on it, is totally fine without it, and we  _ never _ push her.”

That may have been more than Felicity really needed to know about Thea’s sex life, but she did, in a way, ask. And in a way, it helps. 

“I don’t think you’re going to have that exact situation,” Thea says with amusement in her tone. “I mean… I just don’t think that’s going to be something you have to work through the way we did. The way we do.”

Felicity agrees with that, to an extent. They  _ are _ going to have to work through a lot of issues regarding their sex life, but Thea, Sin and Roy’s specific issues are definitely not something they’ll have to deal with. At least not at present.

“What else do you want to know?”

“Do you get jealous?” Felicity asks. “Do  _ they _ get jealous? Do you ever have to worry about one of you feeling left out when it’s just two of you doing something?”

“Yes,” Thea says. “Sometimes I get jealous. Sometimes they do too. It’s not… it’s not the end-all-be-all, and it usually reveals an insecurity in one of our relationships that we need to work on. We can’t afford to let it fester. We can’t allow it to grow into bitterness or anger. That’s what leads to relationship destroying fights.”

That makes sense to Felicity.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Thea tells her. “We  _ do _ fight. And we have. And we’ve pulled ourselves back from the edge of total destruction more than once. Because we care about each other. We need each other. And we need  _ all three _ of us together, but we need the three relationships inside our little bubble to be strong too, or the three of us together aren’t as strong. In this world, with what we do and how we do it, I need that strength.”

“I know what you mean,” Felicity says. “I do too.”

Once, she would have been uncomfortable with how strong and how sharp her need is. Now she just accepts it. She needs them. She needs both of them. And they, in the same way, need each other.

Everything makes sense that way.

“Do you feel weird,” Felicity asks, “When you want one more than another? Like if they’re both in front of you and you want a hug but you want it from one of them specifically more than the other?”

Thea  _ hmmms _ softly. “I think that’s pretty normal. Sometimes I want Sin’s reassurance more than I want Roy, or sometimes I haven’t seen her all day and I really want to kiss her more than I want to kiss Roy. I think it works like any other relationship. Sometimes you just want a specific person. If it’s one more than the other constantly, that would be a cause for concern. We don’t… we don’t get to play favorites. It’s not fair, and it leads to issues.”

“Okay,” Felicity says. 

“Hey, I’m okay, I’m right here.” Thea says, but it’s muffled, like she’s put the phone down or covered it with her hand. “Felicity,” she says, answering a question Felicity can’t hear. Felicity smiles when Thea says, “In a few minutes. I love you.”

“Sorry.” Thea’s voice is clearer now, not muffled at all. “That was Roy. Woke up and couldn’t find me right away.”

“I should let you go back to bed,” Felicity says. “Thanks for talking to me.”

“Anytime.” Thea yawns. “I’m really happy for you, Felicity.”

“Thanks,” Felicity says. “I’m really happy too.”

Thea hangs up with a quiet, “Goodnight.”

Felicity closes her laptop and heads back into the bedroom. On the bed, Tommy and Oliver are sprawled out together. She left from the center, and they haven’t shifted to fill the space she abandoned yet. Carefully, Felicity wiggles her way back between them. She wraps her arms around Tommy and presses her nose against the back of his neck, inhaling his aftershave and the scent of him. She kisses his skin, running her hand down his arm so she can lace her fingers through his. Behind her, Oliver shifts, and she feels his hands reach for her sleepily. She lets him spoon himself against her body.

She feels warm, and safe, and more convinced that they can make this work.

She closes her eyes, and drifts off to sleep between her husbands.

* * *

 

Thea screams.

Oliver takes a step back, but it’s futile because his baby sister is launching herself forward, throwing her arms around his neck and  _ bouncing _ on her toes as she hugs him. 

“Ollie,” she cries. “I’m so happy for you. For all  _ three _ of you.”

And then Oliver’s lost in the strangest sense of bliss. His sister is in his arms, healthy and whole, everybody’s safe, he’s with Felicity, Felicity’s with Tommy, Tommy’s with  _ him _ , and his sister is happy for him. She’s happy that he’s  _ happy _ .

He cups the back of Thea’s head, holds onto her tightly. “Thanks, Speedy.”

It’s evening, and they’re in the lair, readying for a night of patrolling. The city’s been on edge all day, Oliver’s felt it hovering in the air. Something is going down soon in the criminal underworld, and the entire city is subtly reacting to the impending event.

“Seriously,” Thea says, moving from his hug to Tommy’s. “I  _ hoped _ that this would work out for you guys. I did. I just never thought it would really happen.”

“Neither did I,” says Tommy, and his eyes are watery as he holds their sister. “But I’m glad it did.”

It’s still so new, the way Tommy looks at Oliver now. The way, Oliver realizes, that Tommy has always wanted to look at him, but never let himself before. It stirs something inside him, some previously numb part of his heart.

Felicity comes to stand beside Oliver. He turns his head to look at her. Her hair is down and her curls are brushing against her shoulders. She smiles up at him. “I told her,” she says. “I’m sorry.”

Oliver touches her cheek. “It’s alright. She was bound to find out sooner or later.”

Thea pulls away from Tommy and turns to Felicity next. Their hug lasts a little bit longer. “Damn right I was gonna find out,” she says. “The three of you probably couldn’t have kept this a secret to save your lives.”

That is true, Oliver figures. They wouldn’t have been good at keeping this quiet for very long. Still, he’s glad Thea approves. Not that he really thought she wouldn’t, but a part of him was harboring a tiny bit of concern that she would think them ridiculous for trying something where their situation was different than hers.

Oliver didn’t  _ know _ he was in love with Tommy. Thea had described falling in love with Sin and Roy the same way, but Oliver can’t say that about Tommy. He always loved Tommy. He just doesn’t know when that love switched, deepend, changed.

The door at the top of the stairs bangs open, and Roy makes his way down with the thud of his heavy boots on the metal stairs echoing through the room.

“Hey,” he says as he approaches them. He shoves his hands into the pockets of his sweatshirt. “We going to kick some bad-guy ass tonight or what?”

That puts a swift end to any further conversation, because just a moment after Roy says that, Felicity’s phone beeps. “Someone just tripped the silent alarm at Palmer Tech.”

She’s gone from their little circle in an instant, her heels clicking against the floor as she hurries over to the C-shaped desk that holds her three monitors, keyboard and mouse. It’s the central hub of the room.

Oliver glances at Tommy, and he knows they’re both thinking the same thing. There’s no way this is a coincidence.

“Suit up,” Thea says. “Don’t just stand there making heart eyes at each other.”

She pats Oliver on the shoulder as she walks past him towards their gear. Roy shrugs. “You heard the lady. Let’s go.”

It’s raining lightly as Tommy climbs off of his motorcycle, readying his crossbow. Felicity has dismantled the security lock on one of the doors leading into one of the building’s stairwell, complaining all the while about how someone as brilliant as Raymond Palmer should be a little bit  _ smarter _ about his security.

It makes Tommy chuckle under his breath as he swipes the strange device Felicity has constructed through the card reader and the door opens with a beep. He gestures for Oliver to go first, then follows, covering Oliver’s back. Thea and Roy are using another route to get to the R&D lab with the blaring alarm, and Diggle is watching the exits.

One of Felicity’s newer additions to their equipment has been pairs of night goggles. They look like sunglasses, but they provide vision in dark environments without giving away their positions to any hostiles. Tommy slips his on and glances up as the glasses illuminate the stairwell in an eerie green right before his eyes. 

Oliver’s already half a flight up the stairwell, and Tommy follows, keeping an eye on Oliver’s six.

They have a bit of a climb to get to the floor they need, but once they’re there, they use Felicity’s device again to gain access to the lab. It’s ransacked. Tables are overturned, shards of glass litter the floor along with smashed pieces of unidentifiable technology. 

“Damn,” Felicity says, and Tommy knows she’s picking up the video from his and Oliver’s eyeglasses. “Someone really did a number on this place.”

“Any idea what they were looking for?” Oliver says softly.

“I’m scrolling through Palmer Tech’s data now, but there’s not much info about this particular lab that’s not hidden behind  _ heavy _ encryption.”

“That should be a walk in the park for you, babe,” Tommy says. “You eat heavy encryption for breakfast.”

There’s a crash from the far end of the room. Tommy looks to Oliver. Oliver puts a finger to his lips and points to Tommy, then in the direction the noise came from. They creep off to investigate. Tommy has to be careful not to disturb any of the glass or debris on the floor so as not to give away his own position.

Halfway across the lab, Tommy freezes when suddenly there’s a crash  _ behind _ them. He turns, but Oliver is faster, sprinting after the blackish green shape that Tommy can see running towards the doors. For a brief moment, Tommy considers following, but then he hears Oliver’s harsh, “Get the other one,” followed by the thud of boots on the stairs as Oliver pursues the adversary.

Tommy glances back to where they initially heard the first noise, and carefully steps around an overturned lab table. As he lifts his crossbow and moves around a section of shelving that’s been left standing, a flash of lightning illuminates a silhouette of a figure standing in front of the floor to ceiling windows. 

Glinting in his hand, tip pointed at the ground, is a sword.

“It’s about time,” a voice says. It’s low, distorted by technology. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

Tommy lifts a hand to his throat to click his own voice modulator on.

“Who the hell are you?” he asks, putting the figure right in the center of his crossbow sights. He’s closer to the light from the window now, and it’s distorting his view in the night vision glasses, so he taps a button on the side to turn them off. “What the hell do you want?”

The man, if it’s a man, doesn’t answer. Instead he takes two careful steps forward. Tommy doesn’t let him out of his sights though. Not for a second.

“Tommy!” Oliver’s voice is scratchy in his ear, and the static throws Tommy off for a moment. Their connection is usually free of interference.

“HQ,” he says, very softly, even as the man steadily moves closer, lifting his sword. “You there?”

The man takes another step forward, and Tommy matches him with a slow step backwards. He’s holding a crossbow against a sword. Distance is to his advantage.

Felicity still hasn’t answered. Something is very, very wrong. He forces himself to stay focused. 

“You are, in every way, an impossible amount of trouble for me,” the shadow says.  His face is hooded, shrouded in a mask that looks  _ almost _ like the league, but it’s different enough that Tommy can’t say for certain. “And I am tired of dealing with you.”

Another step closer. “Not that it matters this time. I have what I needed.”

Tommy lets a bolt fly from the crossbow. To his complete shock, the figure drops to the floor just in time, skirting away from the quarrel’s path. Flipping a switch, Tommy reloads in a second, and fires another bolt. It hits the table the man has dived behind.

“Stay out of my way,” the voice says from behind him, and Tommy whirls around, throwing a black knife as he flicks the switch to load his bow again.

The throw goes wide—Tommy’s not a knife person, not really, and he’s better when he’s can see his target clearly—but the bolt he fires a second later hits its mark center-of-chest. Right where the heart would be.

Tommy takes the second to flick on his night vision glasses again. They don’t illuminate any more of the man’s face, but he catches the glimpse of a gloved hand wrapping around the quarrell and yanking it out. It couldn’t have sunk in more than an inch, which means…

Body armor.

Felicity  _ still _ hasn’t answered him. And he can’t hear Oliver or the others. “Who the  _ hell _ are you?” he asks again, “And what the  _ fuck _ do you want?”

The sword lifts, and Tommy has to think fast to avoid the lightning-quick swipe of the blade. It’s a distraction, he realizes a moment later.

The man throws something small and round onto the floor, and Tommy barely has a second to register what’s going on, when suddenly his glasses go dark. 

A baby electromagnetic pulse.

With a howl of frustration, he rips off the glasses, followed by his equally useless comm.

Except no, he realizes once the glasses are off. The small lights along the floorboards are out. The exit sign is no longer illuminated.

Another burst of lightning fills the room with enough light for Tommy to figure out a good way to the door, and he shoves it open, practically falling forward into the stairwell. He can hear footsteps going up, and he starts after them.

It’s hard work in his heavy leathers and gear, but the other man is equally laden down, so Tommy is only a few floors behind him when he can hear the door to the roof open.

The rain is now coming down in sheets. Lightning crackles across the sky as Tommy steps onto the roof.

Yeah, definitely not a baby EMP. It’s hit this building, but also seems to have taken out the ones surrounding it. 

Thunder booms as Tommy scans the rooftop for his mystery man. His crossbow is heavy in his hand. 

Behind the thunder, Tommy can hear something else: the  _ thwap-thwap-thwap _ of helicopter blades. A spotlight swoops across the rooftop. It lights up the stranger standing by the helipad for just a moment, and Tommy sprints in his direction firing quarrel after quarrel.

But the helicopter is too close. The man’s gloved hand reaches up to wrap around the ladder dangling from the helicopter. He steps onto the lowest rung and stares right at Tommy as he lifts up off of the roof.

As the copter rises, the man throws off his hood, revealing bright blond hair, a menacing grin, and striking blue eyes.

Tommy has no idea who he is.

* * *

 

Felicity can’t hear them. She can’t find  _ any _ signal at all. It’s her worst nightmare come true; they’re out there, in the field, and she can’t help them. She can’t do  _ anything _ .

It’s only through scanning law enforcement frequencies that she figures out it was an EMP. That’s why she can’t hear her team. That’s why they can’t hear her.

The satellite view of the area doesn’t tell her much, and she can’t make any real sense out of the infrared data she’s pulled. With no additional information, she can’t differentiate one heat signature from another. 

For a frantic minute, she contemplates going out there, trying to find them, trying to  _ help _ . But reason sinks in like a sickness in her stomach. What if they come back and can’t find her? What if one of them comes back  _ hurt _ ?

No, she doesn’t dare leave.

What she does instead is what she does best. Tommy, Oliver, Thea and Roy return to find her scribbling ideas on the clear board she’s wheeled out into the center of the room. She’s got the cap of a neon pink marker wedged between her teeth, and she spins around without removing it when the door’s clanging announces that they’ve returned.

She drops the pen and  _ runs _ . Oliver is down the stairs first so it’s his arms she throws herself into. He groans quietly, but holds onto her tightly. When he lets her go, she asks, “What happened?”

The words are barely out of her mouth before she’s in Tommy’s arms.

“EMP,” Oliver says, confirming what she already suspected. “Fried our communications.”

He sets a worthless earpiece on her desk. 

“It fried  _ everything _ ,” Roy grumbles, flicking the switch on the baby flashlight he keeps in his boot. It doesn’t so much as let out a flicker of light. Angrily, he tosses it into the trash can. Thea’s earpiece follows it a moment later.

“I chased after him,” Tommy says, letting go of Felicity. “But I lost him on the roof. He had a chopper come in to pick him up. And he had to have timed that right or the EMP would have knocked that bird right out of the sky.”

Oliver peels off his jacket. “How’d he fight?”

“Like League,” Tommy says. Felicity figures he’s fought Sara enough times to know. “But with a bit of something else thrown in.”

“Not too many blondes in the league of assassins,” Roy says. “Besides the Canary, at least.”

“His voice was distorted,” Felicity says. “I got some of it on a recording before the EMP went off. I’ve got some software running to try to see if I can get it back to normal, see if I can do a voice match somehow. It’s a long shot, but I’ve seen longer shots that ended up panning out.”

She turns to Oliver. “Did you get anything from the one you fought?”

He shakes his head. “I had him pinned. He took a pill. Then he was gone.”

“That’s terrifying,” Thea says. “Hired mooks don’t kill themselves.  _ Believers _ do.”

“But believers in what?” Tommy wonders.

“In  _ who _ ,” Roy says. “It’s usually a who.”

“What else have you figured out?” Oliver asks, gesturing to Felicity’s new workspace.

She hustles back over to her computers and quickly sits in her swivel chair. “They did quite a number on Palmer Tech,” she says. “I mean this  _ really  _ crippled them. Fried servers, useless prototypes, you name it, these guys destroyed it.”

“How do you know that?” Oliver asks.

“...I hacked Palmer’s email,” Felicity says. When Oliver raises his eyebrows, she continues defensively, “He hacked mine  _ first _ .”

Roy hides a laugh behind a cough. Felicity knows that he’s no friend of Palmer, not after watching the guy hit on Thea one too many times.

Tommy picks up an inch-thick stack of paper covered in highlighting and post-it notes and scribbles from a red pen. “And the research you’re doing?”

“Trying to figure out what our Ghost was after.” She takes the paper from him and starts to flip through the pages. “If they were just going to steal some tech, why destroy everything so completely? I think Ray had something that could have  _ stopped _ whatever this guy is planning. All we know about him so far is that he’s resourceful and sneaky, and so far he has been very very careful not to tip his hand.”

She stops, her thumb catching on the page she’s after. “Here,” she holds the pages out so Oliver and Tommy can see them. “These are the most likely.”

“Omega?” Tommy asks, pointing to one of the projects listed.

“Genesis?” Oliver quirks an eyebrow.

“Omega is an antiviral computer program,” Felicity fills in. “And Genesis is a series of blueprints for what could potentially be a self-sustaining biodome.”

Thea peeks over Tommy’s shoulder. “And you think that our ghost, as you call him, was interested in either of those?”

“They’re possibilities,” she concedes. “He could have been after Palmer Tech’s new bio chip that can heal spinal damage for all I know.”

Roy gives her an incredulous look. “Palmer Tech has a bio chip that can heal spinal damage?”

Felicity winces in frustration. “No. No, they do not, that would be  _ ridiculous _ , but it’s probably something Palmer has given serious thought to at one point or another. The man wouldn’t know a bad idea if it blew up in front of him.” She turns to Tommy. “I am pretty sure that has happened before, actually.”

“So.” Thea crosses her arms. “What do we do about all of this?”

“Sleep,” Tommy says abruptly, setting the papers in his hand down. “We go home, and we get some rest. We stay alert, and we stay safe. There’s nothing more we can do tonight.

Felicity only partially agrees. She feels like there are  _ thousands _ more things she can do, more answers she can find. But Tommy’s mention of sleep is like a cheat code for her brain. Suddenly the adrenaline keeping her awake and moving is gone. Like a deflated balloon. Her shoulders feel heavy, so do her eyelids.

Her eyes ache as she packs up her gear to make the drive home. Tommy and Oliver follow around twenty minutes behind her. It’s enough time for her to go through her normal nightly routine before they arrive. She’s just climbed into bed when she hears the sound of the two of them entering. She vaguely recognizes the sound of Oliver’s voice alerting her to the fact that they’re home. 

A warm body slides into bed next to her. “Hey,” she murmurs, half asleep already, her brain completely unable to process which one of them it is. Her question is answered when lips kiss her cheek. Tommy shaved that morning; Oliver did not.

Thoughts of masked men and EMPs and helicopters filter through her head. She shifts in bed, snuggling in closer to Tommy, letting his arms around her chase away the fear of things she cannot affect or change.

There’s no reason to fear the future.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge, huge, HUGE thanks to everyone who is sticking with this story, believe it or not, there's still quite a bit of plot left to go. I work retail, so the rest of this month is likely gonna be insane for me, but here's hoping I'll have another chapter for you in the new year.


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